Scaled Down Scales

...And the Hundred Heroes...

…Capture the Crystal Key…

Relvain Blackaxe the Dragonpinner saw the fleeing slaves pointing upward. Not believing they would fight hard for their Githyanki overlords, she was not surprised they were fleeing.

What she saw next did surprise her: The the Githyanki themselves were fleeing.

They had more to fight for. She was part of the third wave of the attack, but even that wave should not be enough to collapse Garaitha’s Anvil’s defenses.

They, too, pointed upward.

Relvain looked where they pointed.

The admiral’s flagship, the Cev’ren, was making its escape, its sails aflame.

A cheer went up from the Hundred Heroes. Yet she was not cheered.

“Remember the mission!” she cried. “Kada’ne must not be allowed to escape!”

And began running to the dock where their maps had indicated his flagship had been berthed. “That’s where we’ll find Team Admiral,” she told herself. The priest who had been healing her in the fight followed right behind.

When she got there, she found Nox Rhasgar helping the semi-conscious members of Team Admiral onto a Githyanki vessel. She introduced the priest, Sered to the others.

She was able to help with the sails and get the ship moving quickly, but Aurora lost control and their ship spiraled right on past the Cev’ren.

Then grapples shot out from the pirate vessel and latched onto their ship.

It was only then that she realized who had set the sails ablaze: Admiral Kada’ne was standing over the unconscious body of Andrea Ravn.

Admiral Kada’ne looked up from the body of the unconscious Dragonborn. “No!” he shouted, as his minions fired their grapples into the scout ship spiralling past them out of control. “Pirates will be pirates,” he told himself as his men leaped onto the grappled ship.

Nox Rhasgar knew they had to drive the Minions from their vessel. But he saw an opportunity to hit even more before they had time to come across. Quite a few of them had gathered near the forecastle of the admiral’s flagship.

So he hit them with an Ignition burst before they got their chance to board. They had nowhere to run, so they jumped onto two of the Astral Whitewings. The overburdened reptiles dropped suddenly and flew back to the shipyard.

“That should cut their shrieking.”

She and Delis concentrated on the other Minions as the admiral came across to their vessel and was engaged by Relvain. Finally the only minions who remained were the Psychic Archers.

And one Whitewing with a couple of minions on its back.

Its Stunning Shrieks were even worse than the Psychic Shots from the archers, so Nox concentrated his attacks on the flying reptile. Eventually, he was able to drive it back to the battle below.

Delis the Unselie was concentrating on the Psychic Archers which had so bedeviled them on the docks. But now they had their admiral to protect them. Kada’ne would point at them just as she got them in her sights and banish them — temporarily — to another dimension.

Sered the Skywalker got the message: Relvain wanted him to go over to the other ship, to prevent the admiral from using his flurries to bounce back and forth between them.

He was pretty sure the dwarf didn’t know the advantages of sticking close to a Priest of Pelor, Going over to the other ship was easy. And back, if necessary.

He strolled on over to the other vessel. Walking on air.

“That’s why they call me Skywalker,” he told Delis who was standing open-mouthed on the other side.

The admiral did not make it easy for them. Another flurry of blades — this one centered on Relvain — left her in need of healing.

They were all in need of healing. And the only mass heal Sered could do required them to group up. Close together. Where the admiral’s Flurry of Blades could be used on all of them.

The Flurry of Blades could be used for another purpose: Kada’ne used it on Relvain, nearly killing her; when the flurry got him clear of Relvain, he used a Telekinetic leap to cross back to his flagship and engage Sered.

“Oh, well,” he thought. “Time for the Aura of Astral Radiance.”

His body began to glow with swirls of divine radiance darting ever further from his body until the area within 15 feet was granting both protection for his allies and destruction for the enemies of Pelor.

“Not quite a mass heal,” he shouted. “But, if you’re bloodied stay within the aura and it will heal you!”

He didn’t tell them they would also do more damage to their enemies.

Protected by the aura, Relvain was able to get between the admiral and Sered. That gave them all they needed to bring down the coward. The entire area between the forecastle and the sterncastle was dangerous to Kada’ne now. Whenever he entered that main deck of his own flagship, the divine radiance attached him and protected the enhanced Team Admiral.

When they searched the admiral’s body, they found the crystal key Haryssus and Bejam believe is crucial to taking control of the Sovereign Gate.

When they flew both ships back to Garaitha’s Anvil, they found a surprise: The Hundred Heroes, backed by the slaves who revolted against the Githyanki, had routed the remaining slavers.

Megan Swiftblade told them how it happened. “When the Githyanki saw their admiral fleeing the grabbed the remaining ships and fled as well.”

It made sense to Sered. “So they were not willing to fight and die for leaders who would not stand with them?”

“The few left behind either died bravely, scurried to hidey holes in the shipyard, or surrendered to the Hundred Heroes,” she told him. “We are still ferreting out the last of the hiders. With the help of the ex-slaves, who know the place better than we do.”

...To Help Nox Rhasgar...

…In a Desperate Chase…

“Not hard to keep her alive,” he thought. “Relvain attracts all the attacks and then blocks them. Either that, or they glance off her armor.”

When the blows did land Sered easily healed her. He didn’t even have to exhaust his own health to do so.

The a cry went up among their enemies. The Githyanki were all pointing upward — which in the Anvil meant toward the great portal which occupied the center of the demi-plane. Their cries were not happy. The ship they watched was damaged and lurching upward, almost out of control.

“Kada’ne! Kada’ne!” they shouted, among much else. As they began to flee — some leaping on other craft to get away; others running to hide in the storerooms of the shipyard itself — Relvain came over to explain.

When Sered told him that was good, that no more heroes need suffer and die, the Dwarven Shieldmaiden disagreed.

“Remember the mission! We are trying to stop the admiral to get the Crystal Key he carries.”

Then she took off running.

Sered could think of nothing else to do but run after her. She seemed to know where she was going.

That turned out to a ship, at dock. A small ship. Some kind of scouting ship for the Githyanki navy.

“Pirates,” Sered told himself. “Pirates would need a fast scouting ship to find their targets in the Astral Sea.”

A lone Dragonborn was helping other adventurers onto the ship.

“The admiral is getting away!” Relvain shouted to the Dragonborn.

“I know,” the Dragonborn replied. “We have to chase him down. His ship is badly damaged. And Andrea Ravn is on it, trying to damage it further.”

“Damage it further?!”

“Last I saw her, she was using her breath on the sails. I don’t know what’s gotten into her. She says she has the Blood of Io. Says we all have it. All us Dragonborn, anyway.”

Along with an Elven Ranger they introduced as Delis, they helped the others onto the ship.

They unhooked the lines holding the ship to the dock and it lurched upward.

“Not as awkwardly as the admiral’s flagship,” he admitted. "But we’re going to have to learn fly this thing, if we’re going to catch Kada’ne before he reaches the portal.

Andrea Ravn continued her game of cat-and-mouse. She knew her allies were shooting at the admiral’s flagship. Some of their blasts were hitting. But she had no way of letting them know how well she was doing.

Nox Rhasgar agreed with Sered’s assessment. Controlling the scout ship — known as the Iliyoru — would be difficult. Seeing the sails flapping loose in the wind, he sent Relvain aloft to secure the sails.

“I may not know how to sail this craft,” Relvain shouted from the mast. “But I can surely pull on a rope!” She did just that and the mainsail was no longer flapping.

The scout ship pitched under Nox’s feet as Aurora tried to bring her under control, swinging wide over the shipyard below. He could see some Githyanki and Coalition forces still locked in combat, neither side giving ground in the ongoing assault.

Then suddenly, a group of white shapes peeled away from a skirmish with the Coalition’s griffon riders. At first, Nox thought they were running.

Eight white reptilian creatures winged their way up and toward Iliyoru with a shriek, their
Githyanki riders spurring them on. He jumped into one of Spell Turrets and cast one of his Elemental Bolts at one of the Astral Whitewings, which were now assaulting their vessel.

The creature was hurt, which frightened its rider. Nox could now see the reptilian creatures — he wouldn’t call them dragons unless he saw their breath weapons — were ridden by Githyanki.

“Minions, by the look of the way that one is running,” he told the others who took up positions in the Force Ballistas to blast at the other Whitewings and at the admiral’s ship as well.

Aurora was having difficulty figuring out the arcane secrets of the Helm which controlled the ship. By watching the Cev’ren’s erratic flight, Nox guessed Andrea was having some success disabling more sails on the ship ahead of them.

“We might even be gaining ground!” he shouted.

Then Relvain fell to the deck as she tried to swing to the other mast. Aurora gave up on the Arcana and simply grabbed ahold of the wheel and used it to swing their ship back and forth, to prevent the attacks from above from hitting them.

Sered missed twice with the Force Ballista, and Aurora continued working the wheel with great effect.

“I think she’s even learning to speed us up by using the wind,” Nox told himself. An explosion on the admiral’s flagship told him Andrea was having some success. “And Relvain’s great strength has got the rest of the sails under control.”

“Little more we can do with the sails and the Helm,” Aurora told him. “I’m going to try figuring out the arcane controls again.”

Sered fired an Astral Seal at the flagship.

“That will make it easier for me to hit it.”

But whatever Aurora was trying, it failed. The Iliyoru went into an out-of-control spiral which brought it into range of the Cev’ren’s grapples.

...When the Admiral...

…Is Frightened into a Desperate Run

She also decided to trap the admiral by further crippling his flagship, which was still under repair. Without further explanation, she leaped into the air, flew past a Warmaster who wounded her badly, jumped onto the side of the Cev’ren, and set one of its sail aflame.

Nox could see the terrified look on the admiral’s face. He turned to tell Delis what had happened. His words were drowned out by three cracks of lightning.

Before Nox could ask himself whether Kada’ne’s response would be fight or flight, he got his answer: When he looked back, the admiral’s ship was already floundering its way upward.

Although it was rising quickly, he could tell it was not flying as fast as it might.

“Not with one of its sails in flames and its repairs still incomplete.” But it was rising…

…rising toward the portal at the center of Garaitha’s Anvil.

The crew of the other ship was looking uneasily toward their fleeing leader. Nox could tell they knew they were being abandoned to allow Kada’ne’s getaway. So he decided to attack.

They were all perched atop a higher shelf of the shipyard — up where both ships had been berthed. Perched behind a makeshift barricade of supplies and ship-repair parts. The shelf itself protected them from Nox’s sorcery.

So he climbed one of the strange ladders the shipyard workers used to get from one level to another.

And came under withering fire from the Githyanki behind the barricades as soon as he got to their level.

Andrea Ravn knew what she wanted to do: Disable the Kada’ne’s flagship before it was repaired and make a run for it.

Grasping the edge of the gunwale and heaving upward, she saw the nearest sail, blasting it with her Dragonbreath. The Blood of Io let transform the lightning of her breath weapon into fire. The sail erupted in flame.

From her vantage clinging to the rail, she could look directly into Admiral Kada’ne’s eyes. And saw fear … pure unadulterated fear.

He began shouting orders to his crew in Deep Speech. Andrea could not understand the language, but she could tell the crew was confused, somehow conflicted between the their fear of the admiral and their unwillingness to carry out whatever order he was giving them.

Then one of the Blademasters in the crew stepped forward — apparently willing to do Kada’ne’s bidding. He pointed at the admiral, drew his hand into a fist, and threw the fist over the side.

Then Andrea knew what the admiral was ordering. The admiral soared over the gunwale. She just didn’t understand why. She was sure Kada’ne — like most Githyanki of his rank — could telekinetic leap off the ship if he wanted to run away. Why did he need his crew to throw him overboard. From the looks on the other crewmen, she could tell they were equally baffled. Even the Blademaster seemed to be puzzled.

Lightning burst from the admiral’s outstretched palms. His Soulstorm Strike blasted the chains which held the Cev’ren to the dock — surpassing the damage Andrea could accomplish with her Lightning Breath and turning the chains into molten metal. Then he used his own Telekinetic Leap to fly back to the deck of the ship…

… just as the ship lurched upward, into the sky …

…toward the seething portal at the center of Garaitha’s Anvil.

That was when Andrea realized what the admiral was doing: He was running, like the coward he always was.

But this time the coward was running on a crippled ship … with its sails in flames.

And she was clinging to the gunwales of that same ship. She could jump off and rejoin her party. Or she could stay on the flagship and try to stay alive and damage it further. “That would be quite a game of cat-and-mouse,” she thought. “Only who would be the cat? And who would be the mouse?”

“The Dragonborn is not used to fighting without an armored wall in front of him. He rushed right in, never knowing how dangerous that is for a Sorcerer.”

The Psychic Archers from the Iliyoru dazed Nox with their Psychic Shot arrows and had him bloodied in seconds. Delis concentrated her fire on the archers even as the Corsair Cutters moved in to finish the job.

And now the archers were dazing Delis as well.

Nox used a desperate teleport to drop back and heal himself while they finished off the minions. None of whom looked very willing to fight to the death for a leader who had already escaped and left them to fight and die.

They still had to deal with the Warmaster of the Iliyoru. He took Nox right to the brink of death.

But Delis knew she could out-maneuver the Githyanki, even if he was able to take Nox out of the fight. Nox might die, but the Warmaster was going down as well.

The Warmaster seemed to realize this about the same time Delis did. He made a run for his ship, making it back to the deck, trying to release its chains and escape with his admiral.

Delis caught up with him first, then the wounded Nox.

They finished him off before he had a chance to release the Iliyoru. And Delis knew what would come next: a chase — if they could figure out how to fly the ship — and a boarding action — if they could figure out how to fight one of the most powerful Githyanki they had ever faced.

...Andrea Decides...

…To Stop the Admiral’s Flagship.

“We all have the Blood of Io within us,” she told him. “Some of us — like Garen, and now me — just come to realize it more fully.”

She unfolded her wings. Once vestigial, they now were large and strong enough for her to fly short distances.

She told them she was worried. the admiral was trying to get his flagship into condition to flee. And they had no one who knew how to fly the other ship or how to fire its weapons.

She assumed that, if they could set his sails afire, the admiral would have to give up his chance to run.

And they needed to kill or capture the admiral…to get the key he carried.

That gave Andrea something to do with her wings.

She got a running start and leaped into the air. She flew over the first barricade before her wings began to tire.

Relvain the Dragonpinner took up the chant as the third wave prepared to go through the Portals. “A hundred as a thousand. A hundred as a thousand!”

Nox Rhasgar watched in amazement as Andrea flew at the largest of the Githyanki. It drew its silver sword and prepared for her attack.

Andrea landed on the barrel it was hiding behind.

Landed hard, because her wings were tired. The Githyanki drew back to defend himself…

…from an attack that never came. Andrea launched herself once again into the air above him. He swung wildly and his silver sword cut her badly. But she flew over him and landed well behind the line of defenders.

She taunted the Githyanki, but the admiral ordered them to stand fast.

For protection, he ordered the last crewmen off a nearby boat and demanded they stop Andrea. Then he went back to the repair of his own flagship….

…Well, to order the repair. He was yelling at dockworkers as well as the crew of his ship, which was obviously not yet ready to fly.

The admiral was also yelling at the few crewmen who still remained on the other ship. Nox thought he was ordering them to attack Andrea and protect him from the crazed Dragonborn Warlord.

Andrea did not wait for them to attack her. She ran toward the flagship and threw herself one more time into the air. This time she flew to the side of the admiral’s ship and grabbed ahold of some nets hanging over the side just as her wings gave out.

Nox knew what she planned to do next. He saw her drawing in her breath.

She was about to breathe fire and try to set the sails of the warship aflame.

...Through the Giants...

…To Link Up…

Delis saw the Eldritch Giant was now working on the control panel. She was sure it was one of the Fire Giants.

Even though its attention was on its task, it still heard sneaking around in the piles of equipment.

“Better hearing than a bunch of serfs used to toiling at the forges,” she admitted.

Luring the Giants back to the corridor where she could fight them one at a time, she started picking them off one at a time. The Fire Giant Serfs ran for it the first time she hit each of them with one of her arrows.

Then she came to one which was tougher — a Fire Giant Forgemaster.

Krasire made his way back to the Swiftriders. Megan needed to be told they had tried to find a way to get the team going after Admiral Kada’ne. But some giants were between them and the team.

It took the Eldritch Giant longer than Nox Rhasgar expected to bring down the force gates. But he was definitely better at it than the Fire Giants.

Now they were fighting both — Fire Giants and the Eldritch Giant.

He was surprised at how quickly the Fire Giants were defeated. The Serfs ran away at the first opportunity. The Forgemaster broke out of the Blood-Shadow trap Shadowfox penned him in, but he died quickly after that.

“Must not have any protection from my fire.”

Aurora didn’t really want to fight the Giants. When they broke through the force gates, however, she didn’t see an alternative. “I don’t think we can assault the barricades with Giants at our heels.”

Trinity Shadowfox was disappointed the Blood Shadows were unable to pen the Fire Giant, but he was glad it went down.

The Eldtritch Giant was a different story. It kept casting enormous fields of undulating magic.

As soon as he pulled it out of the center — or Aurora whipped it out with her Thorn Whips — it could call it back into itself and send it out as a blast. They were all taking a lot of damage from that.

...Goes in Behind Team Admiral...

…With Delis Erinthal and Krasire…

…trying to maintain contact and Megan Swiftblade’s Freeriders trying to make sure they can all get out. And Relvain the Dragonpinner waiting for the third wave … the main assault.

Krasire was somewhat satified that Aurora had incorporated some of his ideas into the plan they eventually settled on.

Team Admiral were going in first. Megan Swiftblade and her Freeriders were going in on the second wave — which was dubbed the “Stealth Wave.” He and Delis Erinthal would go with Megan and try to help her maintain contact with Aurora’s Team Admiral. The third wave was being called the “Main Assault” — led by The Dragonpinner herself — but everybody knew it was really a feint to draw attention from Team Admiral.

He and Delis were taking a lot of explosives in with them — all they could fit in his Bag of Holding.

When they got to the scaffolding Team Admiral planned to use as their entry point, they found evidence of a fight there. Dead Githyanki all over.

“Looks like their cover was not maintained.”

Privately, Krasire hoped they had just run into a routine patrol.

They placed barrels of explosives a key points on the scaffolds ready to blow if they needed to cover a hasty retreat. That was looking more likely if Team Admiral’s cover was blown.

They climbed the rickety structure and went through the hole in the wall. They found a small storage room. Then a hallway.

At the close end of the hall was a room with two Eldritch Giants bringing in supplies: wood and ingots mostly. At the other end of the hall, they found a forge — sized for giants.

He heard shouting behind him. Before he had a chance to hide, Delis was behind a forge furnace and the Eldritch Giants had spotted him.

The Dragonpinner sat sharpening her axe. The first two waves were just not her style. “I’m not built for stealth,” she said as she prepared for the main attack on the shipyard.

Delis Erinthal had to change her tactics once Krasire disappeared … seemingly shattered into a cloud of crystals.

The Eldritch Giants had spotted Krasire right away. Delis hid as soon as she heard the Giants shouting at each other. She wasn’t surprised they had heard Krasire. He wasn’t very stealthy.

“Stealthy for a rock, I guess.” But not as stealthy as an The Huntress of Winter’s Eye.

She had stayed out of sight while Krasire was attacked by the two Giants. Then he was shattered into a thousand crystals. One of the Giants left.

She decided she should work her way back to Megan without letting the Giants spot her. But the remaining eldritch creature was able to spot her before she got out and she had to start fighting it.

The room, with its giant forges and enormous anvils, proved the perfect battleground for her run-and-shoot tactics, allowing her to hide most of the time. The Giant had no such advantage and Delis found herself humming the tune to “Giants Don’t Sneak.”

Even before Krasire came back — “How did he do that?” — she was pretty sure she could kill the big creature and continue their mission without him. Once he got back they finished it off fairly quickly.

She scouted ahead and found the other Eidritch Giant had joined some Fire Giants who were trying to get through a magickal force door.

Beyond, she could see Nox trying to jam the door against their efforts.

...Fail to Prevent...

…Team Admiral…

…from making it to the docks.

Shade opened the door using the Thief’s Tools which Andrea loaned her. They peeked inside and saw two Fire Giants carrying metal balls from a room at the end of the hall toward an opening in the other side of the hall.

Loud crashing noises emanated from another room at their end of the hall.

She was able to sneak over and see what was making the noise: Two Arcane Giants — who looked a lot like the Eldritch Giants they fought back at the Sovereign Gate — were using gates near the ceiling to bring in supplies for the shipyard.

“Ingots of metal…and heavy wooden beams,” she observed. “I would not like to fight in there where they could drop that stuff on my head.”

At the other end of the hall she discovered a foundery. Elemental and Fire Giants were directing their minions at the forges. So she decided to follow the two Giants they had seen earlier.

The room on the other side was stacked with war materials…and it looked to her like some of it had already been shipped out. Beyond that she could see shimmering force gates and a patrol beyond.

“They must have let the Fire Giants through to the docks.”

She went back to report her findings to the others.

Nox Rhasgar decided to use his Arcana to figure out the panel beside to the Force Gates.

Andrea Ravn agreed they should ignore the dangerous rooms between them and the docks and go straight for the Force Gates.

“Our mission is to get to the admiral before he knows he’s being attacked,” she told them. “The sooner we can get through these guys the sooner we get to the admiral. If we can do that before the Fire Giants and Eldritch Giants know we are here, we might not even have to fight them at all.”

Sneaking as best each could, they made their way to the storage room. Hiding behind some wire-frame boxes — well, Shadowfox hid on top — they sent Nox forward to see if he could open the Force Gates.

She was pretty sure the guards on the other side could not see the Sorceror. The forces of the gates made the air all wobbly if you tried to look through them. Nox made himself as hard to see as possible by sticking close to the wall as worked on the panel.

Andrea was positive they would see him once the gates were down.

Sure enough.

When the gates disappeared, the guards formed up and attacked the Sorceror. Andrea knew he would expect them to rush to his aid. But she had another idea.

“Follow me,” she told the others. She led them around to another Force Gate — which had also been opened by Nox. Then, they were able to attack the guards in the rear as they attacked Nox.

The Sorceror did not wait around to be trapped as he had in the last battle.

This time he telelported out of the fray and joined them in their attack from the other side.

By the time Nox got around to back them up, they were already putting the Giant Fomorian Guards and some of their Githyanki friends on the run.

“Minions,” she snorted, even though two of the Githyanki stayed to fight. Alarms were going up all over and soon more waves of minions were coming at them as fast as they could put them on the run.

She knew they had to stop the waves from continuing, so she told Nox to see if he could re-close the Force Gates.

“And see if you can jam the mechanism. We’re gonna need enough time to fight our way to Admiral Kada’ne’s ship.”

Nox Rhasgar decided to use his Athletics to complete the first part of the effort to jam the Force Gates shut and stop the waves of Minions. “Everybody always forgets how strong Sorcerors are,” With brute force, he unlocked the inhibitors that controlled the flow of arcane power to the gates. Once that was done, however, his bulging forearms could do no more. “Unlocked is unlocked,” he told himself. “Maybe I can do the rest with Arcana.”

Nox tapped into the magic within one of the gates, gaining control of its flow.

Aurora saw how Nox was working the magic at one gate, so she went to the other and did the same thing to control its flow. "Once it’s controlled, though, there nothing more to do with our Arcana. We can turn them on, but it’s going to take some Thievery to jam the controls into the on position and prevent the re-inforcements on the other side from just re-opening them and hitting us in the rear.

Earlier she had seen the Assassin pick a lock, so she called him over to the panel.

“See if you can override part of the mechanism controlling the gates, Shadowfox,” she suggested.

Once the Assassin got the Force Gates back up, she saw it was just in time: The next wave of minions were not minions at all, but some of the Fire Giants they had seen earlier.

They finished off the Githyanki and their Fomorian minions and did a quick search of the bodies.

All they found were a couple of cameos…depicting Emperor Zetch’r’r.

“At least they might be worth some money,” she thought, pocketing one.

...on the Docks of Garaitha...

…as the Infiltration Team Gets Spotted.

Aurora was glad the ritualists had been able to scry the docks at Garaitha’s Anvil. The whole area was under a Forbiddance ritual to prevent scrying. The Wizards from Nefelus told her the power of the Sovereign Gate enabled them to find The Cev’ren in the vast shipyard in spite of these Forbiddance protections.

They showed her a map. Unfortunately, none of the Portals they had so far been able to find were in the immediate location of the admiral’s flagship — The Cev’ren — but a couple were nearby.

Her plan: To sneak in with the assassin’s guild party and try to capture or kill Admiral Kada’ne to get his crystal key; then, they would be followed five minutes later by wave of stealthy adventurers, each trying to penetrate from a different gate; finally, ten minutes after that, the largest wave with dozens of fighters would attack openly in as many locations as possible.

“Hopefully, the later waves will distract them from the main mission,” she told the Hundred Heroes gathered outside the Fane of Chaniir. “Capturing the crystal key.”

They arranged for a special signal when they had found the key to let the Hundred Heroes know they could withdraw.

“Don’t press your fight so hard you will not be able to break off when we find the key,” she warned them.

Across the bluffs and trails surrounding the fane, she saw the mages of the Coalition scribing dozens of planar portals, causing the fading twilight to blaze with eldritch light.

Spread out before them, the greatest heroes of the mortal realm stood in expectation of the battle to come. Most are on foot, a score or more mounted on steeds still skittish from having made the transit through portals from their own lands.

One force of rangers from the desert lands south of Elsir Vale make a last check of the tack on a flight of griffons.

No one spoke.

At Aurora’s signal, Bejam and his mages activate the planar portal in front of her, and a flare of white light cut through the darkness. Within that light, hazy images of the shipyard flare to life — windowless stone buildings, the open spaces between them thronging with Githyanki and giants.

Shadowfox introduced her to the crowd and she got them worked up before Nox made his speech.

Around her, the Hundred were ready, waiting to move at their word.

Nox made his speech: short but powerful:

“Using the advantage of our surprise, we will hit them — one hundred as a thousand.”
— the final words of Nox Rhasgar’s
speech to the Hundred Heroes

“Hundred as a thousand! Hundred as a thousand!”

Shade was impressed by the way the crowd reacted to Nox’s words. Picking up on them immediately, they began chanting the words louder and louder as Team Admiral stepped through the gate in front of them.

A Githyanki patrol spotted Nox almost as soon as they began to work their way toward their goal: a storeroom they hoped would lead them to the admiral’s ship.

“I guess we’ll have to fight our way in,” she told the others.

The fight did not go well for them. Nox got surrounded — not the sort of position the Sorceror was used to fighting from. Shade herself went down and had to play possum while Aurora healed them.

But she was not a true healer.

“Just a Druid with some good healing spells,” she told himself. The Druid was also summoning animals — firebirds and wolves mostly — to help with the fight.

Then she suddenly realized their mission was not to kill this Githyanki patrol, but to get past them.

In a flash she Ghost-on-the-Rooftopped up the construction equipment and made it through the hole in the wall to the door to the storage room.

“Alas, it is locked.”

She tried to pick the lock, but could not open it.

Looking back down at the rest of the kidnap-the-admiral team, she saw they were in desperate straights.

Nox went down — it was the first time Shade had ever seen him taken out of a fight. Aurora stabilized him, but Shade had to Ghost-on-the-Rooftops back down to pull a potion from the Sorceror’s belt and revive him.

That gave them just enough to finish off the patrol.

“I guess killing them works, too,” she said. “And this way they cannot get help.”

They searched the bodies, but found nothing beyond the usual silver weapons carried by all Githyanki. They knew they had to move on if they were going to be able to use the next wave as a distraction.

...Is a Time for...

Krasire…

In her dream she had finally reached Queen Ileosa and returned her stolen broach. The queen had offered her a job, a job in the Queens Guard. Somehow Andrea knew Nox had gotten a job there, too. Even though he was not in the dream this time.

“Had to kill the darn imps by myself.” She knew she was lying to herself. The House Drakes in the dream city of Korvosa had helped her finish them off. “But the queen didn’t seem so bad. Maybe the rumors aren’t true. The king’s line has always been cursed.”

She found a line at the World Gate. The mages of Nefelus were apparently putting Whitefire Marks on as many of the heroes who were gathering as possible. The cat-girl Druid in front of him was not impressed by the Hundred Heroes.

“Look like wandering mercenaries to me,” she said surveying the crowd.

When they got through the World Gate to the Sovereign Gate, Andrea saw it was well-guarded. She recognized one of the guards — a Freerider named Ragnum Dourstone. Ragnum told them the Githyanki were still trying to use the portals.

Andrea wondered aloud how long it would take for Admiral Kada’ne to catch on.

“We questioned one moving alone, said he was from Utargarth, Utargarath, something like that. Someone named Kada’ne sent him to the fane to see what’s up with the team supposed to be holding it. It’s a safe bet there’ll be more like him coming through soon enough.”

Andrea had good idea what Utargarath was: “Utargaraith is the name of the interplanar shipyards,” she told the Druid, “where the Githyanki build and repair their fleets of astral craft and airships — Garaitha’s Anvil, as it is most commonly translated.”

They found Krasire and took him down the long stairs. Beyond the astral vortex, the exhausted Bejam stood with Haryssus, the works of the eldritch giant’s library spread across the tables.

“We have gained a valuable ally in our fight against the Githyanki,” Bejam said, nodding to the giant. “I have learned much of the operation of this place, but I fear that it spells our doom all the same.”

Haryssus told them the only way to control the Sovereign Gate was to use one the four crystal keys to the plinth at the top of the ivory stairs.

Queen Vlaakith held one, but her key was said to be lost when
she was destroyed.

Zetch’r’r holds one, taken from one of Vlaakith’s captains slain when the new emperor came to power.

Kada’ne, admiral of the Githyanki fleet, holds one.

Do’kan, general and master of the Githyanki ground forces, holds the third.

Remembering what Ragnum Dourstone had said about the admiral, she suggested that was the key they should after.

Bejam told them he had sent word to the Coalition leadership, requesting that they come to the fane for a war council that can decide the Coalition’s course of action.

When they got back to the Chaniri’s cave, however, not all members of the Coalition leadership had made the journey. In particular, Eoffram Troyas remained behind in Brindol to help deal with a Hobgoblin uprising.

“I hope it’s the real thing this time,” Andrea thought. The last time the representative of Brindol had been concerned about Hobgoblins, it was a ruse intended to win votes for the leadership of the Council.

Amyria is here, as are other Coalition members. Andrea recognized Fariex, even though he was in human form.

The cautious Quelenna Entromiel was there as well, potentially undercutting any hope Andrea had of inspiring the Coalition into a quick response to the Githyanki threat.

The war council took place in an abandoned library in the fane. Megan Swiftblade and a dozen other heroes of the Coalition are on guard, but the bulk of those who have come to defend the fane are outside, getting their Whitefire Marks, in line at the World Gate, or in the Well of Worlds, keeping watch against a Githyanki attack.

Bejam tried to convince the Coalition leaders of the danger posed by the extension of the Sovereign Gate’s powers to the World Gates. Andrea told them their walls would be no use against an enemy who could teleport vast armies past their gates.

But Quelenna Entromiel took the lead arguing for caution.

“We are far from our homes and families — the places and people we are bound to defend. This place, these planar sites you speak of are meaningless targets. A majority of our many lands’ heroes are here now to defend these places, and for what?

“This is a fight we cannot win, and as such, it is a fight we cannot consider. Waiting here for eventual attack or, worse, seeking out the Githyanki stretches our already over-extended resources past the breaking point. Instead, we must ask what we might do to hinder the Githyanki. Slow down their plots to give us time to plan a proper defense of
our homelands.”
— Quelenna’s speech to the Council
at the Fane of Chaniir

He called on all his years of experience as one of the secret leaders of Waterdeep. The Lords of Waterdeep did not rule openly. They did not make public speeches like this one.

That did not mean they didn’t have to be persuasive. They had to convince people individually.

“That gives me a lot of experience in convincing other leaders,” he thought. Leaders like the members of the Council.

He could tell his speech had not swayed Quellena. But he was surprised when the vote went against them.

“Not that she could have been convinced.” he thought. “Her mind was made up long ago. I though I could convince the others.”

But Megan Swiftblade was a different story. She seemed moved almost to tears by his words.

“The Coalition’s so-called leaders don’t know what they’re saying,” she snorted. "Bankers and merchant lords, the lot of them. If you say we need to strike this Garaitha’s Anvil, the Freeriders are with you. But there’s nearly a hundred of us — the Freeriders and the other adventurers who have answered your call — here all told, come together to show our strength. With you leading, I promise the rest will follow.”
— Megan Swiftblade’s reply
to Quelenna after the vote

Cain Shadowfox was frustrated. They had a rough map of the docks at Garaitha’s Anvil. But everyone seemed intent on promoting their own plans for how to attack it. They needed to strike hard and fast. But the admiral was known for his caution. Some even called it cowardice. As soon as he knew they were coming for him, they were sure he would flee.

Bejam told him, “The Garaitha docks are set with two score permanent portals.”

He knew it could not be that easy. “Those sigil sequences are one of the most closely guarded secrets of the Githyanki empire,” he pointed out.

“Good,” he told the wizard. “We can teleport right to the admiral’s flagship.”

“We don’t know for sure where the flagship is located,” Bejam told him. “Maybe we can scrye the location.”

“Once again they must have powerful protections against scrying,” Andrea pointed out.

“Yes,” the wizard admitted. “But the power of the Sovereign Gate might be used to overcome those protections.”

As leaders of the Hundred Heroes, Cain thought they could come up with a plan but everybody seemed to be pushing their own ideas, rather than working together.

He thought they should send in the sneakiest of the heroes — maybe even the Freeriders themselves — to infiltrate the shipyards. A distraction was suggested. Andrea had her own ideas about the attack.

“What do you think?”
— Amyria to Aurora
when planning reached an impasse

“Well,” Aurora said, “I think we should lead the attempt to capture the admiral. If we go in first, we will be less likely to spook him into fleeing.”

“What of the others?”

“They can attack once we have had a chance to infiltrate and grab Admiral Kada’ne,” she explained. “They must attack with full force, even if we do not believe they will take the shipyards and hold them.”

Amyria seemed impressed with her ideas. “Everybody will need to be ready to retreat with the admiral once you capture. The Hundred Heroes will have to avoid committing to an all-out attack if they are going to be ready to escape when the time comes.”

She suggested they have a signal to let everyone know they had captured Admiral Kada’ne.

Then Amyria turned to Nox and asked him what he thought of the plan.

“Sounds like a good one,” the Sorceror told them. “If we can get in fast enough, we may be able to catch them before he turns tail and runs.”

They headed through the World Gate to tell the Nefelese ritualists what they needed from their scrying rituals.

...and Learns Much...

…About her Powers

Nox Rhasgar remembered the giant had warned them to go back. Not so much a threat, he thought, as a warning.

Andrea was easily convinced. And, when the Warlord told Relvain she could see magickal shackles on the hands and feet of the Astral Giant, the Dragonpinner decided to go along and concentrate on the Githyanki Shade which had appeared before them. This one looked stronger than the ones they fought back in the fane and was armed with two bastard swords.

But the real problem was the slippery, wet surface of the ivory bridge. Nox was able to climb back up the stairs to where it was dry. He could still hit the ghost from there. No matter where it went.

But the others found it harder. Relvain slipped and fell into the seething vortex of magic. She had a hard time even climbing out.

Andrea had an easier time getting out, but she slipped back in repeatedly.

The Dreamer found herself once again in a swamp looking for a Giant Centipede. She knew she had to kill it to create the Undead Centipede which would one day be known as Nightshade. Even though she was good at stealth, it didn’t seem like there was much to sneak up on in this swamp. She decided to try tracking the creatures. She wasn’t much good at tracking, but it proved easy. “Giant Centipedes leave very distinctive footprints.” When she found one, however, it bit her…

“Back in the secret room at the Fane of Chaniir,” she told herself. But this time she was not wrapped in chains. “Lots of noise outside.”

So she sneaked out and found the fane was bustling with activity. The Alliance was moving in. A Wizard from Nefelus named Bejam filled her in. The fane was cleared — even the Chaniiri they had rescued were gone.

Bejam introduced her to a group of Wizards experimenting on the bodies of the Painbringers they had killed. They were able to transfer some of the magic in the Whitefire Marks — strange tatoos that glowed with white radiant light — to her forearm. They told him the tatoos would enable her to go through a powerful gate to join the strike force that was reconning some place of power they Githyanki were using.

When the ritualists in the next room sent her through, she found lots of dead Githyanki.

“I see Nox and the others have been through here. Lots of scorch marks on these corpses.”

She found a pool of magickal water and a room with two dead giants, then a room with nothing but four mirrors and a stairway leading down.

“Ivory stairs, all carved from a single piece of ivory.” Grim was not sure she wanted to meet the creature whose horn produced such a stairway. At least 300 feet long, she realized by the time she heard the sounds of fighting below.

When she got to the bottom, the fight was not going well. She and Nox were able to damage the powerful ghost they were fighting. When she used her Executioner’s Noose to slide the creature into the maelstrom of magic, it simply used its telekinetic powers to leap to one of the pillars in the vortex.

There Relvain and Andrea had a hard time getting to it. So Grim leapt out to the pillars herself like a Ghost on the Rooftops. She was able to pursue it from pillar to pillar, eventually forcing it back to the bridge.

The ghost returned to its pillars as soon as it could, leaving Relvain once more out of the fight.

“You’re doing something that none of the rest of us can do,” the frustrated Dwarf told her. “You’re herding it.”

Then Andrea felling unconscious. and Grim knew they were really in trouble.

Relvain the Dragonpinner was frustrated. She could see they were close to losing the fight. And she could not get to the ghostly Githyanki as long as he stayed out on the pillars. Just when Shadowfox had finally learned to herd it off them, Andrea went down. “Looks like our healer is dying.”

Andrea Ravn regained consciousness to find herself looking up at Nox. The Sorceror had just poured a potion down her throat.

“Not the Potion of Regeneration I gave him,” she thought, tasting it on her lips. “It must have been one of the Potions of Vitality we found.”

She knew their only chance was if she could keep herself alive. So she healed herself and tried a Defensive Rally to pep up the rest of the party.

“Can’t afford to lose our only healer,” she told them.

Then Trinity Shadowfox brought out a power she had never seen her use before: Blood Shadows. Hiding from the bloodied Shade, she was able to teleport to its pillar and attack it with her Talenta Sharash.

Andrea watched as the blood from the attack drained to the ground and spread out across the creature’s very shadow. The Assassin was about to spill more blood all around the top of that pillar when she noticed a devious grin appear on Shadowfox’s face.

Shaking the scythe-like weapon — first on the next pillar, then on the one behind, and finally at the bridge itself — Shadowfox created three more Blood Shadows. Now, wherever it went it would find a shadow made of its own blood granting anyone who attacked it combat advantage.

When the ghost fled those pillars, Trinity followed it and forced it back onto the ivory bridge, where they were all able to combine their attacks and kill it.

“Now, if she could just learn to combine those Blood Shadows with the herding tactics she uses when she uses the Talenta Sharash as an Executioner’s Noose,” Andrea thought. “She could be really effective.”

...(or Blow Down) a Barrier...

…and Find a Giant…

“He kills the most enemies, he draws the most fire, and his defenses are weaker than ours,” she told Andrea.

But Nox was already working on the wards blocking a stairway he had found in the room he peeked into. She saw he was immediately able to destabilize the wards by exploiting the arcane energies surging around the stairs.

Relvain tried to lift the metal bars blocking their way, but only succeeded in making them harder to stand on. Andrea told her that the Dragonmark she was using to enhance her arcane powers did not seem to be able to help her exploit the energies in the manner Nox had just tried.

Relvain looked around and saw four mirrors on the walls around the circular room. “I’m just a dwarven fighter,” she said. “I don’t see anything.”

She could tell Andrea had further destabilizing the iron bars blocking the stairs, but that did not stop Nox. He was able to balance on the shifting bars well enough that he got out on them and was again able to exploit the energies surging up from the stairs to weaken the wards.

So Relvain decided to try attacking the bars directly with her axe. But her glancing blow only overloaded the wards, destroying the bars and releasing a blast of force which hurt the rest of the group, but left her unharmed.

“It’s only force damage,” she told them. But Nox took further damage when he fell to the stairs below.

It took Roland the Betrayer two days of walking through winding jungle paths to reach the shantytown he had seen from the cliffs. The jungles were full of dangers and he had to fight them, but they were nothing he did not expect. “It’s a jungle, after all,” he told himself.

Andrea Ravn was hardly surprised when four Planestalker Marauders erupted — one after another — from the mirrors after the Stair Gate collapsed.

She was surprised, however, at what happened when they began putting some serious hurt on one of the Planestalkers: First, it partially phased into another plane, making it insubstantial and difficult to damage. Then, it teleported itself and her into that other plane.

She found herself in an extradimensional space 10 feet tall and 20 feet wide. She couldn’t see any of the others and she doubted they could see her.

“I guess I’m on my own,” she said, swinging her new sword — the Sword of Bahamat she planned to give to Garen — and connected solidly. Both of them reappeared back near the Stair Gate.

“When they teleport you,” she told the others, “just hit them as hard as you can.”

They finished off the one which had taken her away, then the next one phased, taking Relvain with it.

“When they phase,” she told Nox, “they are about to teleport you to another dimension.”

Then Relvain reappeared, and they killed the Marauder which had taken her.

The next time she was teleported it took two blows to force it back to their plane of existence. “If you could call this place ‘our plane’ of anything.” she thought.

Admiral Kada’ne was still fretting about the reaction to his decision to send a scout to check out the Fane of Chanir. “I know they think I’m a coward. But those fools should have reported back by now. They think that the Sovereign Gate make them invulnerable.”

Nox Rhasgar was hardly surprised when he found himself whisked away to another dimension.

“Andrea and Relvain both warned me.”

He hit the Planestalker with an Elemental Bolt.

“Not as much magic in this place,” he told himself as the arcane energies left his fingers. “But that should be enough to force it to return me do the Stair Gate.”

Sure enough. As soon as he hit it with the bolt, it took so much damage it could no longer hold them in that strange room. They returned to the exact spots they had been teleported from.

After that, it was no problem to finish it off. But it left no bodies to search. The others gave him the Bloodgem. They had figured out what it was. They told him it would improve his defenses whenever he knocked out or killed an enemy.

“Anything that improves my Reflexes,” he told them as he replaced his Amulet of Truth with the blood-red crystal. Even before he had killed anything while wearing it, he could tell it improved his ability to dodge out of the way of an attack. "I can always put the amulet back on if we need to search for hidden doors.

“Or if you want Insight for diplomatic situations,” Andrea reminded him. Andrea had one of her own and she really liked those Amulets of Truth.

Andrea checked out the other door in the Hall of Shards, but it just turned out to be another way to get to the Stair Gate.

“Just as Andrea had predicted,” he told himself.

They decided to go down the stairs.

“Wouldn’t it be funny if we just came back to this room?” the Warlord joked as they started downward. “From above?”

But that seemed unlikely to Nox since there were no stairs coming down from the ceiling. Sure, the dimensions were strange here near the Sovereign Gate, but he did not see how that could happen.

The ivory stair led them downward. Nox estimated they were about 300 feet down when they saw a white light seething in a corrosive whirlpool filling a vast chamber below.

The air was hazy above a stone platform extending from the bottom of the stairs across the seething vortex. Pillars of glowing stone rose above the maelstrom, their surfaces crawling with an ever-shifting flow of arcane runes.

The far side of the chamber was taken up with what appeared to be an oversized arcanist’s study. Tall shelves and wide tables were covered with well-worn tomes and tattered scrolls.

He was sure Andrea was going to love this place. She was always looking for more rituals, even though she couldn’t perform them all.

A violet-skinned eldritch giant glanced up in surprise at their approach, the Whitefire Mark burning at his wrist as he held up a hand in warning.

“I am Haryssus. It has been long years since any but the masters of this place breached the Stair Gate, but those who did so lived no longer than will you. I have no quarrel with
you. Flee while you can.”

Nox could tell the words were more a warning than a threat. Andrea confirmed this a few seconds later by telling him and Relvain she could detect faint traces of magickal shackles around the giant’s ankles and wrists.

“I don’t think this giant is the real threat,” Relvain told them, shaking off her race’s natural hatred of giants.

A sudden flare of yellow-white light heralded the appearance of a ghostly Githyanki. Larger than the shades they fought in the fane, this creature was wielding twin bastard swords, a white light burning in its eyes as it attacked.

...To Protect Nox...

…From a Hazard Both Friendly and Unfriendly

As she watched Nox attack the Astral Giants in the Shard Room, Andrea noticed the room itself seemed to be a hazard.

The floor and ceiling, composed of huge crystal shards, each had pure planar energy surges within their shards, which focused and honed it like lenses into twin pulsing spheres of white light at the bottom and top of the chamber.

When Nox used an arcane power — in this case his Elemental Bolt with an Elemental Escalation — these Astral Nexuses aided his efforts, but the backlash from that aid could hurt him as well.

Then the Astral Nexus in the ceiling began shooting balls of pure astral essence at the Sorceror.

Using her Dragonmark for focus her Perception on things arcane in nature, she saw that she or Nox could calm the local arcane energies. If successful, the area around them would be outside the hazardous region for a short time.

Andrea could tell that if Nox tried to calm the local energies he would not be able to focus on subduing the Astral Giants.

“So I will just spend as much of my concentration on using my Dragonmark to calm astral energies as it takes,” she told the others. “As long as Nox stays close to me, he should be safe.”

The Dreamer found herself back in the dream: the one where Obanar sent her to investigate the camp of the Hill Giants besieging the City of Argent. Only it was more of a cave than an encampment. “Makes sense,” she thought to herself. “Hill giants would find the nearest cave and set up camp there.” Still it seemed a bit more well-appointed than a makeshift bivouac in an empty cave. “Must’ve been planning this for a long time.” Once again, she found herself in a room with a bunch of giants. She noticed a Fire Elemental dancing in the flames of the hearth. Dashing from the Common Room, she found herself in the quarters of the Hill Giant Shaman. She tried to sneak through, but failed. Captured by the giants, she almost forgot who she was under their torture. Then she woke and remembered: She was Relvain Blackaxe the Dragonpinner

Troops were being brought in through the Portal, which Bejam was now calling “The World Gate.” Defenses were being set up: around the Gate … and outside as well, according to a Freerider she recognized. Sections of the fane had been walled off and mages she recognized from Nefelus were poring over the books Andrea had found in the libraries here.

One of them recognized her and waved.

“I did save their city from Chillreaver,” she thought as they went back to their books.

Bejam told her about the World Gate and the dangers it posed. When he told her the rest of The Order of the Black Feather had gone ahead to scout some mysterious location to which the Gate connected, she volunteered to go and help them.

“But first you will have to be given a Whitefire Mark,” the Deva Wizard told her. “Only Githyanki and their most trusted servants can pass through the World Gate. The Whitefire Marks are how they identify those servants.”

She knew enough about Githyanki to know that Bejam really meant “slaves” when he said “servants.” Just being polite.

A group of Wizards working on the bodies of the two Fomorian Painbringers were able to help Bejam transfer a Whitefire Mark to Relvain’s forearm.

“You can cover it with your armor,” he told her. “But it will feed upon your own life force to power its effects.”

Thus empowered, she was able to step through the World Gate — with the help of some of the ritual casters studying it — to find herself in a strange room crackling with arcane energies.

“Which makes sense,” she told herself. “Bejam said they were siphoning vast amounts of power from the Material Plane to this location.”

That was why the Order had been sent to clear the place.

She found Nox and Andrea in a lounge area. They were trying to bottle the magic-infused waters of a pool there. They only got two of their bottles filled before the arcane energies of the pool were depleted.

“We’ll have to wait 24 hours for the pool to be back to full strength,” Andrea told her. "We don’t have time for that. We can expect more Githyanki to come through here before it replenishes itself.

Andrea gave her one of the vials. “Drink this to turn a short rest into a more thorough sleep.” The other vial went to Nox.

They told her about another room — accessible from both sides — where two Astral Giants were meditating on what appeared to be Ritual Books. Relvain could tell Andrea could not wait to study the books herself.

They decided to try Diplomacy on the giants. The giants weren’t having any. They started blasting as soon as she opened her mouth.

When Nox returned fire, the Astral Nexus above them blasted him as well. When he was hit, Relvain found herself caught in the secondary burst which centered on Nox.

She was dazed by the blast. She decided to concentrate on defending herself while she tried to shake that off.

Which took her longer than she expected.

“Why are there no reports from the Sovereign Gate?” Admiral Kada’ne shouted. “Send someone to check on them.”

Nox Rhasgar saw that Relvain was having difficulty shaking off the effects of the white burst of astral energies. So he concentrated on shooting Energy Bolts at the Astral Giants. They separated, each heading towards a different door at each end of the platform bridging the room.

Eventually Relvain emerged from her daze to leap across to that bridge and engage the giants directly. By then Nox had knocked one of them out and was concentrating on the one which remained.

The one which Relvain was now forcing to concentrate on her.

Made taking it down that much easier. “Quick fight,” he thought to himself.

After the fight, they searched the bodies and found a Bloodgem Shard and 480 platinum pieces.

But Nox was already ready for the next fight. Peeking through the doors at one end of the bridge, he found another strange room: a round chamber of pale gray stone.

The air inside flared with swirling currents of white light — four circular mirrors were set along the walls, their surfaces rippling like quicksilver. In the center of the chamber, the stone floor was replaced by an uneven grid of black steel bars.

A stone plinth stands at the center of the barred floor, its sides set with glowing keyholes. Beneath the bars, steep ivory stairs could be seen twisting down into a haze of white light.

Using his Arcane powers, Nox was able to determine the ambient astral energy on the other side of the door was harmless. A stronger pulse of arcane power was surging, however, in the four mirrors.

Something was lurking within their silvered surfaces, waiting to be called forth.

The Trihorn Behemoth Andrea was riding had feet that were bigger than any giant had, so he suggested the Dragonborn Warlord wait at the mouth of the Portal Chamber until the Githyanki realized their weapons had disappeared.

Only one of the strike force noticed Nox sneaking in. His shouted warning was too late. He ran to the pile of weapons, grabbed them, and teleported back to the Portal Chamber which was sorta located in the middle of the lounge. There he threw the swords into the Astral Mist.

They didn’t quite go as far as he had hoped. The weapons just floated in the mist where he threw them.

“Oh, well, at least they don’t have them.”

Relvain the Dragonpinner found herself once again in the bowels of a Hill Giant fortress. “I must be dreaming again,” she thought. She remembered that in this dream Obanar had sent her to scout the area the Hill Giants were using as a base of operations to attack Argent, the Silver City.

When Andrea Ravn swallowed the Potion of Regeneration, she felt it sap the last of her emotional and physical reserves.

She hoped it would keep her alive long enough for Nox’s plan to work.

She charged around the curve of the wall on the back of her mount. The Behemoth’s heavy footsteps convinced her that sneaking up on the Strike Force was something best left to Nox and Jax.

Keeping the Githyanki from getting their weapons back proved harder than they expected. The Mindlashers didn’t seem to need them and the Warmongers were able to get past her using their Telekinetic Leaps. The Astraan — who was the only Githyanki carrying his weapon on his person — even helped by using his telekinetic powers to give the Warmongers extra leaps.

The Astraan’s weapon — a silver dagger — proved less effective.

“He couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn,” Andrea observed as he watched the Astraan try to hit the Trihorn. “Or the backside of my mount.”

Eventually the battle focused around the only chokepoint between the Githyanki and their weapons: the doorway to the Portal Chamber.

By inching her way into position to flank the Mindlashers and give her mount a chance to use her horns, she was able to get to a spot where she could heal Nox.

Who was now beset by the Warmongers who had retrieved their weapons. Beset inside the Portal Chamber.

The Portal Chamber where Nox’s magickal fire seemed incapable of missing. The Warmongers died first, then the Mindlashers. The Astraan surprised them when he ran. Instead of heading for one of the other exits from the lounge, it leapt into the Astral Mist and then to the Portal itself.

Andrea knew the Portal was some kind of Sovereign Gate, capable of sucking magickal energies from other realms, even other Planes of Existence.

Yet it had no runes: the runes that were key to understanding every other gate or portal that she had ever seen.

“How can you find it without the runes to concentrate upon?”

She was so desperate to understand the Sovereign Gate that she used all of the arcane powers her Dragonmark gave her to try and perceive how the Portal — or Gate or whatever it was — functioned.

But all she got was a brief vision of the place where the Astraan fled: some kind of shipyard where an Astral Fleet was assembling.

...The World Gate...

…to the Well of the Worlds…

“Damn Imps,” Andrea Ravn swore as she woke up from the dream of Korvosa.

She had been determined to beat them this time. She had convinced Jaz and Nox to think about Korvosa as the Chaniri priests performed the ritual that would allow them to all be in the same dream.

But the result was the same: The mad prophet foretold of doom involving a plague and Nox — who appeared as a vengeful friend in this dream — was once again able to heal himself of the madman’s disease; the imps attacked again, drawing the attention of the Korvosan Guard; once again, the guards found the queen’s broach on her and carted them all off to the castle…

…and once again their sleep was less restful than it should have been.

“So we’ll have to go through the World Gate tired and angry,” she told the others.

They took Krasire’s mount, but not their own. Jaz rode it, while Andrea and Nox would try to make it to the door. Even without opening it — “Who knows what’s on the other side?” — they might be able to wedge themselves into the vestibule and avoid the worst effects of the Astral Mist.

Jaz decided against entering the dream as a drug addict. It was what Andrea wanted her to do, but it sounded just a little too dangerous. As they meditated on the mythical city of Korvosa, she imagined herself as the friend of a drug addict who was strung out on Shiver. Gaedren Lamm, her friend’s drug dealer, would still have to pay for his crimes, but she would be just a little more Streetwise. It turned out that meant that Andrea didn’t even recognize her in the dream. And Gaedren Lamm was already dead. On his body Andrea found a broken broach. They took it to a jeweler who refused to fix it. He recognized it as the queen’s stolen broach and he didn’t want to get caught with stolen property.

But they still had to go through the World Gate — through something called the Sovereign Gate — to the Well of the Worlds.

“The Alliance needs to know what the emperor plans to do with all this extra magickal energy they are pulling from our world,” Bejam told her. The Wizard from Nefelus was convinced the Githyanki would not be increasing their risk of discovery if they were not expecting to use the Material Plane’s magickal energy for something important.

That meant they had to go back to the Well of the Worlds soon, even though Nox and Andrea had been forced back the last time they tried by some kind of Astral Shade. They expected it to be even stronger this time.

“It hadn’t been attacked in thousands of years the last time,” Andrea told her. “This time it may be expecting us.”

The Dreamer found himself once again escorting Andrea through the streets of Korvosa. The riots were still going on all around them, crazies screaming about dooms coming down on the city. Once again, one of them rushed at the Dreamer while shouting about some plague which was coming to the city in the future. Once again, the disease he carried was very real … very much in the present. Once again, the Dreamer shook him off and was infected himself. Once again, he healed himself. Once again, they made their way through the Academae District. Once again, he and Andrea looked at each other — the drug addict’s friend was not paying attention — and he fired at the imps who were attacking them. Once again, he missed and the imps got the broach. Then the Queen’s Guard showed up. Once again, they clubbed the imps, found the broach, and hauled them off to prison for possession of stolen property. The Dreamer awoke, as Nox Rhasgar … once again, rested … but not well rested.

Nox Rhasgar knew what his job was: Blast his way past the Shade and get his back to the door. The vestibule by the door was the only place he could make a stand without getting swept by the Shade into the Astral Mist which surrounded the Sovereign Gate itself.

Jaz was coming through on Krasire’s mount — a hippogryph which could fly out of the mist. Andrea could fly — a bit — using her vestigial wings.

But Nox would have to rely on the others if he should find himself swimming in the stuff. As much as he like casting in the room filled with arcane energies, he didn’t want to find himself adrift in the Astral Mist again.

Getting the Shade out from between him and the door wasn’t as hard as he expected. He hit it with an Elemental Bolt — this time it didn’t turn substantial — it teleported to another location and hit them with an Astral Shockwave.

But he didn’t get his back all the way to the door, and the thing’s next teleport put it right between him and the door.

Eventually he was able to work his way all the way to the door and pour on the damage. Jaz was getting the hang of her Backstabs and Sneak Attacks.

The Shade got Andrea down several times, but her regenerating armor kept bringing her back to her feet. Nox downed his own Potion of Regeneration just in case it was able to knock them both out.

Then the creature started to work on Jaz as well. If it got them all three out simultaneously, it could finish them off, one by one, even with their regeneration going full blast.

They managed to kill it just as Jaz was bloodied for the first time.

“Not a lot of time to spare,” Nox thought to himself as they sent Jaz out to explore the next room.

Andrea Ravn swore she would never again try the streets of Korvosa in her dreams. But she had to admit she had to sleep sometime. And that meant the possibility of dreaming. “What was it that Jerath always said about that?” she asked. “I remember: ‘Aye, there’s the rub’.”

Jaz remembered the trick she and Maggie used to play on their teachers.

At the Black Dragon Society Enclave, they were each taught to impersonate the same people — sort of stereotypes, Maggie liked say, although their teachers called them “archetypes.” One of these archetypes was named Jasmine. They practiced Jasmine with each other so much their Jasmine voices became indistinguishable from each other.

Eventually their physical Jasmine disguises become so close the pictures their teachers gave them that Maggie — who was much better at disguise than Demyse — was able to duplicate her Jasmine disguise.

Perfectly.

So perfectly their teachers often mistook one for the other. This enabled one of them to sneak away for various forms of mischief while the other pretended to be the other … as Jasmine.

She thought about this as she slipped through the door of the domed room where the Sovereign Gate was located.

“Just a curving hall,” she thought as she worked her way around to the right. Then she found a kind of lounge, filled with couches.

Beyond the couches, the dome opened into a window. Out of the window, Jaz could see the Astral Sea. Floating there were other globes. She was able to imagine that the dome she was in looked much like those, if she could view this one from the other globes.

Lounging on some of the couches: Githyanki, Warmongers and Mindlashers; the one who seemed to be the leader was armed only with a silver dagger.

“They don’t seem to be expecting us,” she told herself, noting they had left their weapons — except that silver dagger — piled on their gear nearby. “I better report back to the others.”

They seemed to be gathered around a pool of water in the center of the lounge.

“Might be just the thing that Andrea was hoping to find when she brought that bottle.”

...To the Well of Worlds...

…And Quickly back again.

As his companions rested from their battle with the last of the Githyanki invaders, the robed Githyanki told Nox Rhasgar the temple complex was called the Fane of Chaniir. Andrea had already convinced their leader, the priestess known as Talanee, to share some of their secrets.

Now that they had helped them clear their fane of invaders, the Chaniri — which is what they called themselves — were glad to share their story and answer Nox’s questions.

“The only problem,” he told himself, “is I’m not sure what to ask.”

They told him they were planning to leave. After they had consecrated the bodies of their dead and buried them.

“This holy place has lost its sanctity," Talanee told him, "debased as it is by the blood of Zetch’r’r’s traitors. Our fate lies elsewhere now.”

He knew that Zetch’r’r was the new emperor of all the Githyanki. Until now, though, he had no idea that some Githyanki were opposed to his rule, almost loyal to their previous ruler — Queen Vlaakith.

“Zetch’r’r is a dog leading dogs," the Chaniri leader told him. “But those who lash themselves to his leash see not the chains he wears. The false emperor talks of rebuilding the glory of the Githyanki, but he is a pawn of forces he has not the mind to understand nor the will to stand against.”

Talanee continued: “In the long eons since the gods and Primordials fought for control of all creation, Bahamut and Tiamat have undergone a never-ending sibling war. Driven apart yet drawn constantly together by their dichotomous natures, the two gods fight endless battles, both face to face and through their proxies in all the many worlds."

When Andrea woke up, Nox could see she was interested in this part of the story. She asked about it.

“Among all races, long ages of peace follow epochs of tyranny as each deity ekes out a temporary victory over the other,” Talanee told them. “But in the end, always, the battle continues. Until now.”

Nox wanted to know what was different about the War Between the Dragons now. The Githyanki priestess started to answer before he could even ask.

“In this age, a new war looms between these two ancient adversaries. On both sides, armies amass across worlds in preparation for brutal conflict, but Tiamat means to see that this battle with Bahamut is the last. The dragon queen seeks to slay the Platinum Lord, and Zetch’r’r has sworn himself and the Githyanki to the service of this dark goal.”

The Chaniri soon became so busy burying their dead that Nox had time to sleep. He dreamt of a city he had only heard of in dreams. The Fire Archon in his dream about the City of Brass told him the Crown of Fangs could be found in a place called Kosovo.

And now he dreamed of that place.

The streets of Kosovo were already dangerous. People rioting; the king was dead. But the noise of the riots were not the only thing keeping the Dreamer from his goal — the palace — the rioting had wakened monsters in the sewers. The pavement cracked and a horrible creature burst forth. The Dreamer fired an Elemental Bolt at it.

And missed.

Nox woke to find himself back in the Fane of Chaniir. The Chaniri were still burying their dead.

Well, not burying them in any sense that Nox was used to. They cleaned the bodies, consecrating them for burial. Then they had piled them into the furthest rooms of the fane. Now they were walling up those rooms, using the broken stones the invaders had left everywhere in their path of destruction.

As they worked he asked Talanee why they were being tortured.

“The Chanhiri’s task is to keep watch over the World Gate for the Githyanki," she told him. "In making our opposition known to the plots of the false emperor Zetch’r’r, we were first shunned, then assaulted. However, our craft allowed us to seal the gate in ways that Zetch’r’r’s thralls could not overcome.”

After Andrea woke up, she had some questions of her own. And she began her own research in the library of the fane.

The World Gate was opened by the Chaniri as they prepared to depart through it.

Nox had already used a scroll to send a message to Amyria. He got a response asking for the runes inscribed around the World Gate. When they sent those, help arrived in the form a task force led by Bejam.

Bejam was the Nefalese representative on the Alliance’s Council. Andrea showed him the library and he got to work.

The Nefelese Wizards in the task force wanted to know what the World Gate was. So Bejam asked Talanee and Andrea, who was already studying there.

“The World Gates are the prime portals through which the Githyanki first mastered the connections between planes," Talanee told them. But this answer was not enough for Andrea.

“This World Gate is set within the mortal realm, with others in the Feywild and the Shadowfell. More distant gates in nameless planes are whispered of, but they are beyond my knowledge.”

Nox saw that the Githyanki were preparing to perform some ritual magic at the glowing sphere they called the World Gate. Apparently this gave Andrea ideas.

She showed Krasire’s Ritual Book to the Chaniri ritual casters and asked them if they could cast one of the rituals she could not master: Dream Concordance.

Nox went along with it when she asked him to join her in this concordance: where they could both join each other in a dream about the city of Kosovo. Nox did not share his previous dream about the city.

In the dream, Andrea was trying to take a broach to the queen, but they were arrested instead when the queens guards found the broach on his person. They woke little rested.

Just like before.

The group who came through the Gate had been busy while they dreamed. They were organizing the defense. Apparently they agreed with Nox’s plan to use the Freeriders to patrol the area around the outside of the fane. Inside, they were preparing magickal defenses for the inevitable moment when Emperor Zetch’r’r’s forces realize their strike force had not reported back from the Fane of Chaniir.

Bejam called the Andrea to one of the library chambers in the fane — the one she had shown him. He told Nox, “I do not want the things I have learned to become common knowledge yet.”

He followed Bejam and Andrea there. Bejam had obviously developed some understanding of the operation of the World Gate. He told them of the existence of the Well of Worlds, but Nox could see what he had learned had put him on edge.

“The Githyanki priestess spoke truth regarding the World Gates," he told them. "The circle here siphons the planar energy of the mortal realm, drawing it to a site beyond. This Well of Worlds is spoken of in the lore here, but the fact that the Githyanki have kept the site secret even from Nefelus demonstrates its importance. Indeed, the existence of the Well and its power goes some way toward explaining the advantage the Githyanki have gained in this war.”

Andrea had been more interested in the discovery of the World Gates and how it fit into the history of the Githyanki, but Nox remembered what she said of the The Well of Worlds: “It is a site of powerful planar magic, built by Chanhiir in the lost age of our race and open only to those of Githyanki blood. It is a planar mote existing in no world—fueled by the energy of the Astral Sea but not set within it. The Well of Worlds is the center of the portal network that is the lifeblood of the Githyanki empire. It is the site through which elite Githyanki strike teams travel the planes, including the force charged with seizing the fane.”

“How did they send the Fomorian Painbringers through?” Andrea wanted to know. “They are certainly not Githyanki.”

He already had heard this from Priestess Talanee, but he let the Wizard from Nefelus explain: “The Whitefire Mark is a mystical sigil implanted only in the most trusted servants of the Githyanki — those granted access to the Well of Worlds. The sigils are a permanent magical brand that burns with a white flame powered by the bearer’s own life force.”

But Bejam wanted to tell them more about the Well of the World, even though Nox could tell Andrea was already thinking about how they could use the sigils to infiltrate the Well itself.

“The Well is a place that touches all other places — all planes of existence, all sites in those planes. From the Well of Worlds, the Githyanki have access to anywhere in all of creation.”

But it seemed that even more was happening.

“If the Well of Worlds was merely as this Talanee described it," Bejam said, “a portal for moving the Githyanki’s elite forces — I would wish to know more of it. However, the brief period of my study here has shown that the World Gate is drawing off planar energy greatly in excess of its normal operation.”

“I can see that,” Andrea said. “I have been reading the lore before you got here. According to this library, the planar energy should not be enough to be detectable.”

Bejam agreed, telling them his fellow Wizards were detecting a high rate of power drain from the Mortal Realm. “These books say it is the general policy of the Githyanki to keep drain low. That is probably why the Nefelese never detected it before. They wanted to keep it secret.”

The wizard’s face grew grim. "From what the Chanhiri said, Zetch’r’r had specific purpose in seizing the fane, and I am fearful as to what that purpose might be.”

Andrea asked him how long before reinforcements came through to find out what happened to Emperor Zetch’r’r’s forces who attacked the fane.

“I do not know how long the Githyanki will await the return of their forces from the fane," Bejam told them. "But if they discover us here, their retribution will be swift. We must send a request to the Coalition for reinforcements to hold the fane in the event of another Githyanki assault. For my part, I will convince Nefelus to send more aid of its own. If the worst comes to pass, we can hopefully hold the fane long enough for you to discover what the Well of Worlds is — and what kind of threat it represents.”

“So, you want us to go through this World Gate?” he asked.

Andrea was already ahead of him. “Can your Wizards transfer the Whitefire Marks to us? Otherwise, the World Gate will not let us through. We are not Githyanki.”

Bejam told them he could perform the ritual himself. He and Andrea agreed get the marks.

The ritual by which the Whitefire Mark is bonded to a living creature seemed simple enough, but the exertion that showed in Bejam when he was done showed the potency of the magic that has been imbued.

As the ritual was completed, the sigil flared to life on his wrist, its outline of white flame writhing around the stark lines of a Githyanki blade.

Though the mark could be covered by his sleeve or Andrea’s armor easily
enough, Nox felt its flame still flaring — pulsing in time with the beating of his heart.

While Bejam was completing the ritual, the Chaniri finished opening the World Gate and stepped through. Two Nefelese mages began staring into its murky depth, trying to discern what lay on the other side.

“Beyond the World Gate lies a portal the likes of which we have not seen before. It has no sigil sequence. Rather, its location is fixed by psychic energy and the flow of planar power through it. A force of Githyanki a half-dozen strong arrived there only an hour ago, but we have seen no other traffic before or since.”

So urgent was the need to find out what was happening at the Well of the Worlds that Nox and Andrea rode their mounts through before the others had time to have their Whitefire Marks transferred.

Closer in, Roland the Betrayer saw what looked to him like a thin, tenuous footpath winding its way along the low ridge, just inside the fog line. A wider path headed downhill, into the jungle and in the approximate direction of that hump near the center of the valley. The small hill with defensive walls of some kind near its top. “Not a very high place to build a fortification,” he thought as began to work his way down the footpath.

Andrea Ravn found herself wishing she had not used her Draconic sidestep to escape the Shade’s initial blast.

“It would have proved more useful now,” she told herself. “Or about any other time during this fight.”

It was hard to stay on the platform…

“Although he hasn’t used the Astral Blast as often as I expected.”

While the Shade managed to stay just out of her reach, Andrea used her rudimentary wings to get herself back to the platform — repeatedly. After Nox went into his Dragonborn-fireball form, she had to use her chain to drag him back to the platform, even though he could use his fireballs from anywhere.

She had used her Foe Stone to figure out the thing was vulnerable to Force damage. The thing seemed to be trying to tell her more. It kept vibrating after some of the Shade’s attacks.

“It’s almost as if the Foe Stone is trying to tell me that those attacks have something else to them…”

…Something it just wasn’t able to communicate.

She noticed the creature became substantial after they hit it. Nox was able to set it up with his fire breath and then hit it with his Elemental Bolts. Even Andrea could use her breath weapon to force it to become substantial.

Which gave Nox more chance to hit it with powerful spells. Which seemed to be especially accurate in the magic-infused chamber.

Soon she was wheezing from overusing her breath weapon and they were both taking heavy damage from the Shade. She still could not reach it, so she had no more chance to set up Nox’s bolts. Half of them were passing through, doing some damage, but not enough.

“What we really need is Krasire on his mount.” She knew the Shardmind’s Hippogriff could fly through the Astral Mist with ease. And the Foe Stone said the creature would be vulnerable to his force magic.

Fortunately, she had remembered to memorize the Sigils on the World Gate. They were able to go back through to get reinforcements.

...in the Portal Hall...

…Finally Gets the Order and the Freeriders…

Andrea Ravn wanted to press on quickly to the next room. She wasn’t sure yet she could trust the mystery woman’s skills as a scout.

“Calls herself ‘Jaz’,” she thought to herself. “Yet she couldn’t sneak up on those torturers.”

She threw open the double doors and found another pair of doors just past a small room.

From beyond the second set of double doors came a sudden shout of alarm and the sounds of combat. Over the clash of swords and the shrieks of dying Githyanki, the familiar voice of Megan Swiftblade rang out.

“You laid claim to Elsir Vale, but our lands still stand free! Our people will not kneel to you, mudskin, nor will the wider world you covet! We will not fall!”

“I’m leading the way,” Andrea yelled as she forced her way through those doors as well. She could hear the others following. Even the Githyanki priests were anxious to get in on the battle to free their fane.

Before the stairs on the far side of the hall, Megan Swiftblade stood with the severed head of a Githyanki captain clutched by the hair. The Freeriders were bloodied but defiant behind her, the Githyanki in the chamber spreading out in preparation for attack.

She could tell the Freeriders were outnumbered — for all of Megan’s bravado. As Jaz charged in to surprise them from behind, Andrea took advantage of the fact the invader Githyanki’s attention was all on Megan to get a little surprise of her own.

The Freeriders and the robed Githyanki who were fighting on their side were soon cutting down the invaders and getting cut down themselves. She made a fateful decision and started healing the Freeriders whenever they fell.

“Probably the best thing I can do to win this battle,” she told herself as she instructed the others to drink the potions of regeneration she had brought for them.

Soon the odds were a little more even.

Storm Johnson told his followers, “We need something which will help us intimidate the Djinn of the City of Brass if we are ever to negotiate with them. I have found references to a powerful artifact: the Crown of Fangs.” He told them it was made from the teeth of the first Blue Dragon. “Khazavon is said to have sprung from the ground where one of the Scales of Io fell. He allied with Tiamat from the beginning and fathered the line which became the Blue Dragon Horde. When he was slain, his parts were deliberately scattered, so they could not be used to bring him back. Khazavon’s teeth were used to make a Major Artifact which could possibly help someone who was sufficiently attuned to it to intimidate the rulers of the City of Brass. I will send a message to Amyria and see if she can contact Nox Rhasgar. Maybe in his travels he can find the crown.”

Relvain Blackaxe knew she was having a dream about the Hill Giants attacking the city of Argent. Behind enemy lines. Inside the fortress they had built outside the city. She was fighting her way out. Swinging her axe in frustration, she missed…

…and awoke to find herself alone in the secret room they had discovered in the Githyanki tunnel complex near Thiradeth, an outpost north of Elsir Vale.

No sign of her companions, except the Minotaur who still snored loudly in the corner. Assuming they had pressed onward, she applied the right-hand rule and found another room full of rotting corpses, then a martial-arts training facility.

“Looks like they’ve been here,” she told herself when she saw two more corpses. Unlike the Githyanki corpses she found in the first room, these were freshly killed. And she heard the sound of fighting from the room beyond.

She found a battle royale there: Githyanki corpses everywhere; Megan and the Freeriders with Andrea healing them.

Her allies had even recruited some of the robe-wearing Githyanki to fight on their side. Unarmed, they were willing to fight against the heavily armored invaders who were wielding their silver swords.

She saw two groups of the sword-wielders who were wearing plate. Andrea was attracting the attention of the closer bunch, so she decided to charge across to the others who were essentially unscathed. Well, the robed ones had the far group surrounded — along with some of the Freeriders — but it was taking shouts of encouragement from Andrea to keep them on their feet.

“I’ll give them something to keep their minds off theses cloth- and leather-wearers,” she told herself. For the Freeriders preferred leather so they could keep their bow arms free.

Once Andrea and the mystery elf finished off the other bunch they came over to help. But she had already bloodied one of them.

Maggie agreed to meet with Garen Bladerun. He was interested in her plan to help in the rebuilding of the city of Overlook. The Paladin had plans of his own: to start a new training academy for Paladins of Bahamat. She knew just the place.

As the battle drew to a close, Jaz remembered how to use her Sneak Attacks along with her Backstabs. She found she could even do Sneak Attacks without stabbing her opponents in the back.

Soon she was doing more damage than the dwarven shieldmaiden who had joined the battle late.

Once they were able to concentrate on the last two Githyanki, Andrea introduced her to the others as an Elf. She could tell the Dwarf didn’t like Elves much.

She wasn’t so sure about one of the Githyanki priests. While the other clerics wandered off to consecrate their dead, he was eying her suspicious. “I wonder if he suspects my true race?” she asked herself.

As if in answer, the priest winked at her. Then he walked over and told her he wanted to show her something.

He took her over to the body of a Warmonger he had been searching. From under the dead Githyanki’s breastplate he pulled out a hat.

An ordinary hat.

The force sphere in the middle of the room pulsed ominously. Spitting out the occasional tendril of force.

...Get an Unexpected Rescue...

…Just As a Torture Session Begins.

When Krasire told Andrea of meditations, the Dragonborn Warlord told her to return to those reveries.

“Get some rest. You still look exhausted. We’ll take care of this ambush you’ve discovered.”

Sure enough, while he meditated, Krasire was able to follow their battle telepathically. The ambushers were attacked, killed. And he got his rest.

He came out of his meditations to find Shadowfox chained in the corner. They both seemed to be refreshed.

He heard the sounds of battle echoing through the halls outside the secret room where they were resting. Reluctantly, he unchained Shadowfox and they hurried toward the crashing and roaring.

The roaring turned out to be Deep Speech and was being produced by two Fomorian Painbringers. Apparently they had been torturing a group of the Githyanki in the saffron robes.

This brought both of them up short. They had run into a fair number of the robes as they worked their way through the complex of the tunnels. The robe-wearers chained to the wall in this room were the first they had seen who were alive.

The ruined martial training hall was lined with shattered weapon racks and filled with what appear to be pillars of yellow-white light extending floor to ceiling. These pillars shifted slowly, drifting across the chamber as they flared and faded. In the haze of light, 10 Githyanki in tattered robes were chained together hand and foot and huddled along one wall.

Two hulking fomorians paced before them, one clubbing the sodden remains of a Githyanki corpse with its flail. The other was already attacking a mystery woman who seemed to have joined their infiltration team.

“Look, I know they act like they are full of themselves,” Megan Swiftblade told the other Freeriders. She knew they needed to take some time to heal. “But Garen told me about his cousin Andrea. He and Samwise were the ones who went after Sarshan when he was assassinating Freeriders. We should at least give these Black Feathers a chance to prove themselves. Notice how the opposition has grown weaker the farther in we go? They may be drawing off the Githyanki. For now, we need to rest. We may be able to get some sleep if the Order of the Black Feather has attracted Githyanki attention.”

Nox Rhasgar was frustrated. At first the weaker of the two Painbringers had put the Evil Eye on Nox himself, despite the difficulty it had overcoming his Will.

Yet the Fomorian switched the Eye to Krasire when it became apparent the Shardmind was doing most of the damage. Nox was not used to being beat out by others in that department.

Then he remembered his Flame Bracers. And almost immediately he started feeling the fire. He didn’t even have to transform into his Burning Transformation alter ego. Andrea told him the enemies had poor reflexes, he switched from Ignition to Elemental Bolts.

Sure enough. They were more successful. While the Giant Fomorians had the Fortitude to just power their way through the Ignition fires, their lumbering forms could not dodge a concentrated Elemental Bolt.

“Have to remember that: Ignition for little things that can dodge; Elemental Bolts for big guys who cannot dodge.”

The Dreamer found it dark and strange in the swamp where she hid to find the Giant Centipede. “Must be the Shadowfell,” she thought. “Good place to find slithering creatures.” No matter how she hid, however, she found no suitable creature for her necromantic experiment. For some reason, she knew she had to craft an undead centipede. She even had a name for it once she created it. “Nightshade.” And Cain woke with start to find herself chained in the secret room of the cave complex.

Andrea Ravn was standing between the two hulking brutes, so she was taking most of the damage. Gulping a Potion of the Regeneration, she was able to stay alive. But, boy, was she glad when they finally went down.

“The potion had drained the last of my resources,” she told them. And she offered Krasire the magical components he needed to perform his Comrade’s Succor ritual. “It’s the only way I’m going to be able to survive the next battle.”

On the bodies of the Fomorians, they found:

a dark iron ring;

a pair of tattered gray boots (with kind of a haunting aspect to them, which drew Shadowfox’s attention);

four amulets; and

three gems.

The conversation she started once she unchained the Githyanki and treated their wounds produced some interesting information:

They are known as The Faithful of Chanhir.

They are led by a priestess named Talanee.

Their Fane was attacked by the followers of the new leader of the Githyanki, Zetch’r’r.

...To Help Andrea and Nox...

…Ambush the Ambushers Waiting…

…for them outside the secret room.

Andrea Ravn woke from a disturbing dream with a start. In the dream, she was arrested for possession of a stolen item — the Queen’s Broach.

Unable to return to sleep, she tried to sketch out the city which figured so prominently in her dreams. As far as she knew, it did not actually exist on the material plane of existence. In the dreams, however, Korvosa did not seem to be part of any of the non-material planes.

Once she sketched out the map she was building in her head from the dreams, she noticed that Krasire seemed to be struggling with his meditations. Interrupting those meditations didn’t seem a good idea at first, but the Shardmind soon focused his eyes on her and spoke.

“I have been struggling with the mental powers around us. First they tried to find our hideout. Then they concluded we had left the caves after suffering the attack of the Shades. I think they believe the Shades drove us out after we killed their Mindlashers.”

Andrea asked her if they were still outside the secret room.

“They stay away from the balcony. Seem to know it is haunted by the Shades. They may be invaders in this complex. Seem to know they can pass through the balcony without being attacked as long as they don’t linger.”

The elements of a plan began to form in Andrea’s mind.

“They have reinforced the guardpost outside. We may be trapped in here. Some of them are waiting to ambush us below the balcony. I’ve been able to penetrate their mental defenses. I need to meditate more to get some rest. And to keep anyone elsewhere in the complex from knowing we are here.”

As Krasire resumed his meditations, Andrea told their new companion — Demyse was the mystery woman’s name — and Nox what her plan entailed.

The Dreamer found himself swimming in the Grand Canal of the City of Brass, having scoured the markets of the city to find the information Storm Johnson was seeking. A Fire Archon, impressed with the Dreamer’s ability to swim in a canal of molten fire, tells him the truth: A Cyclops slave Seer has foretold that only the Crown of Fangs can free the slaves bound to the Efreets who rule the city. It is located in Korvosa, the Jewel of Varisia. Just then, Nox Rhasgar woke to find himself back in the caves.

Demyse Darkstrider liked the plan. She would sneak in and make her way down the stairs and try to backstab the ambushers below.

Then Andrea would grab Nox, run out to the circular opening in the balcony, leap through it, and use her wings to glide to the floor, where Nox would unleash a wave of fire on the ambushers.

Like so many plans, it failed to survive contact with the enemy.

First, as she tried to sneak down the stairs, one of the ambushers waiting at the bottom spotted her.

Second, when Andrea tried to fly down carrying the other Dragonborn, her wings did not support the two as well as the Warlord seemed to think they would.

“I would describe it as more of a controlled fall,” she thought to herself. “I bet Andrea could have managed it fine by herself. The Sorcerer may be even heavier than she is.”

The Sorcerer leapt to his feet and sprayed her enemies with fire, while Demyse herself found a likely corner to hide in.

“Too far from the enemy to backstab from here,” she thought.

Spotting a large number of bedrolls closer to the Githyanki, she realized where she would be spending most of the rest of the battle.

“Hiding under bedrolls; jumping out to stab them in the back.”

The Dreamer found herself once again in the city Korvosa. She was attacked by a sick madman-prophet. Then by imps. The Korvosan Guard captured her and found the Queen’s Broach on her. Andrea Ravn woke to find herself back in the secret room in the caves.

Nox Rhasgar found himself unable to escalate his Elemental Bolts. The Warmonger’s Telekinetic Crush did not hinder him much — he never depended much on mobility anyway — but the Warmonger’s Soulsword burst left him stunned.

The Mindlashers could do the the Telekinetic Crush as well. They had no stunning attacks, so they took down the Warmonger first. The Mindlasher were forced to rely on their Psychic Slams.

“Sure they keep knocking me down,” he thought. “But I just get back up and hit them with escalated bolts.”

The mystery lady was putting out a lot of backstabbing damage as well, hiding in the bedrolls and hitting the Mindlashers when they least expected it.

Soon, the enemies were all dead.

“No loot on them, though, since we already looted these rooms.”

Hearing screams from the room ahead, they sent the mystery woman — she said her name was Demyse Darkstryder — ahead to scout after a short rest.

...Shadowfox Alive...

…Cain Finds a Hidey Hole…

…where the remnants of the Order of the Black Feather can recuperate, while hoping their partners — The Freeriders led by Megan Swiftblade — are faring better.

Shade knew she had to be careful. She felt weak. The Dragonborn Warlord had restored her confidence. She was not sure how many times his shouts of encouragement would continue to re-invigorate her. She was able to creep forward to the edge of the balcony. She saw three Githyanki huddled around a firepit below. They were grousing in Deep Speech. She could tell that from their tone. Then three Shades emerged from the broken statues behind her on the balcony, cutting her off from the others making their down from some other room where they had set a fire. “So much for careful.”

The smoke from the fire forced Krasire further into the cave complex. The others were apparently burning the dead Githyanki bodies — which seemed to be everywhere.

The smoke was problematic. It would make it hard to retreat. If they had to retreat.

“I guess we better be sure we don’t have to do any retreating.”

Amyria had given Krasire a Scroll of Sending — a ritual he didn’t know. He was hoping to find some time to scribe it into his Ritual Book.

So far, no time: Amyria convinced Belinda to portal him to Tokk’it’s ship, which was anchored near a remote outpost north of Overlook; Tokk’it directed him to Birkeni, the half-elf captain at the outpost; Birkeni told him about the dead Githyanki his scouts had found, but when he flew Xerxes there the bodies were gone; it was easy to track Andrea’s Trihorn Behemoth to the mouth of a cave where he almost got blown up by an Astral Vent of some kind.

The cave was where he found The Order of the Black Feather burning the Githyanki bodies — “Weren’t they supposed to be investigating Githyanki bodies?” — and fighting Heroic Shades.

Delis Erinthal was taking her assignment seriously. She did know this Krasire fellow at all. He had made his way to the black crag by air, but now he was sneaking up on the other strangers as they fought some shades in the caves. His attack on Shades relieved her somewhat, so she stepped out of hiding and shot the ghost of some Githyanki hero who was assaulting one of the Dragonborn.

Nox Rhasgar was glad to have Delis’s help — and Krasire’s as well. Sure the Assassin could deal out some damage, but Shadowfox had a habit of getting herself into some bad situations…

…like the one she was in right now: surrounded by enemies, cut off from her friends, constantly being cut down, knocked down, and generally abused.

She had that noose attack, which seemed to be able to move her foes away from her. She even used it to drop one of the Shades through the hole in the balcony.

“Then she stopped using it for tactical advantage.” Nox had noticed that Shadowfox seldom seemed to learn from either her successes or her failures. “She just as likely to repeat the things which didn’t work as those which did work. Maybe it’s those multiple personalities of hers. Maybe she has to learn things over again in each mind that she has.”

In the middle of the valley, Roland the Betrayer saw a low rise, more a barren hump than an actual hill. He could just make out the straight edges of defensive walls near the top. Tendrils of smoke rose from what must be chimneys or campfires nearby.

As they searched the rooms where they fought the Githyanki and the Shades of their fallen heroes, Andrea Ravn was worried.

“Trinity Shadowfox is on her last legs,” she told the rest. “I’m not able to heal her now, let alone in another fight.”

Holing up to rest in a cave complex filled with Githyanki and their mind-reading powers posed its own problems. She had an idea about that, too. Her Dragonmark gave her a solution. All she needed was a place to use it.

Which Shadowfox found.

A secret door led to a hidden room. Inside, they found 360 platinum pieces and a Stone of Flame. Andrea kept the stone, even though she knew Nox could use it better than she could.

Shadowfox told them she had seen two more Githyanki who had not joined the fight.

“Gone to get reinforcements,” Andrea said.

She piled all the silver swords she could find into the secret room. Then she told the others to bed down for a long rest. “I’ve got a Mark of Detection. I can use it to cast Eavesdroppers Foil. Some of these Githyanki seem to be invaders of some kind, who killed the ones in robes. Looks like they looted the place. Bet that’s why we found no loot on the balcony.”

She told them she was sure the invaders had not found the secret room. “It wasn’t looted. That means they never found it. Maybe the Shades of their ancient heroes made it hard for them to search the balcony after they destroyed all the statues.”

Krasire volunteered to stay awake and guard the hidey hole mentally. “Eavesdroppers Foil will not protect us from their mental probing.”

“I can rest while I meditate,” Krasire said.

“Good. If they assault us mentally, you can fend off their efforts. They may even think we retreated from the caves entirely. They have to know we were hurt badly.”

Nox pointed out that Shadowfox had bled all over the place.

She told them to sleep and regain their strength. What was it Jerath always said? “To sleep, perchance to dream.”

As she dropped off, Andrea remembered what Grigore told her when Jerath said that:

...Gives Trinity a Clue...

…About the Reaper’s Masque

After her collapse in the library, Cain dreamed: She was still in the manor house of some ancient necromancer, she knew it. But she did not recognize the room. In the ceiling she saw her Reaper’s Masque. She could not reach it. Not without standing on Andrea’s shoulders. Relvain and Nox lifted her there. She reached up and grasped the masque.

And put it on her face. It began to speak to her.

“Hello, Shade,” said the whispery voice in her head when she awoke. Somehow she knew it was the voice of the masque the Raven Queen had given her. “Put me on.”

She put on the masque, and immediately knew that she was beginning to come into concordance with it.

She found herself lying on a bunk in a gently swaying vessel. It didn’t seem to be a vessel floating on water: Although Shade did not remember ever being on a boat, she knew this somehow.

“Perhaps I was on a boat sometime in my previous lifetime.”

The masque told her to investigate, and she did. Telling herself she would have done it without the prompting.

Emerging from her cabin, she found herself on the deck of Tokk’it’s flying ship, heading north. When she asked Andrea where they were going, the Dragonborn explained they were headed toward Thiradith.

Andrea explained this was a Nerathi ruin which had been rebuilt as a watchtower by the Alliance. From the Letter from Amyria, she knew this meant it was near one of the destinations of the portals which Cachlain told them that the Githyanki were using.

Just before sunset, they saw the watchtower in the distance. An upthrust embankment of sheer stone wall atop a white bluff, she could tell the site commanded a sweeping view of the rocky scrubland that spread to all sides.

A gate and drawbridge allowed access across a steep-sided ravine that protected the site on all sides. Sun-faded flags flew high above the ramparts, and the bridge was already down as they approached, landing far enough away to avoid alarming the outpost.

Birkeni, a veteran half-elf fighter, appeared to be the captain here. He met them at the gate, making no effort to hide his relief at seeing them. He told them there were no
stores or services here.

“I offer you free use of the outpost’s amenities and semiprivate accommodation in the barracks hall.” When Nox asked about the amenities he explained that he only meant the weaponsmith, armorer and such.

Once they arrived in the hall, they discovered they weren’t the first to respond to the watchtower’s summons. Megan Freerider greeted Andrea warmly and told her the Freeriders arrived that morning. “Good thing we were on another mission west of here,” she said. “We don’t have a flying ship to get us around so fast.”

Megan goes on to explain the flying ship is how her friend Garen Bladerun got away from Sarshan’s tower when it collapsed in the Elemental Chaos.

“I told your compatriots this morning all that I can report beyond what was sent in our missive. A week ago, one of our patrols found three dead Githyanki within a hundred strides of each other on one of the foothill tracks."

Then the Half-Elf betrayed one of his own bigotries by using a racial epithet.

“The Mudskins had been in some sort of fight by the look of them, but as the scouts came back to report, they were shadowed by a half-dozen more Githyanki, very much alive. Followed them to within sight of the watchtower, then fell back into the hills again.”

The patrol trail from the watchtower to the foothills was easy to follow, winding through thin stands of jack pine and patches of scrub grass that slowly disappeared as the rocky ground begins to climb.

The day was overcast as they reached a marker Birkeni spoke of — a great arch of rust-colored stone, beyond which the wall of the mountain began to rise.

It didn’t take long to locate the site where the Githyanki were found — three patches of blood-stained rock on the trail.

Of the bodies, there was no sign.

As soon as Andrea Ravn saw Shadowfox go down — for the first of many times — she knew her plan was unraveling. The two of them had climbed up to the entrance of the cave the Githyanki were guarding. The plan was to lower ropes for Nox and Relvain. But Andrea sent Shadowfox on ahead and she got spotted. Nox was climbing up on his own and had already reached the lower ledge. Relvain was using the ropes Andrea had lowered. Her progress was slow. And Shadowfox was already down, even if she was only faking.

They found another trail near the bodies and followed to the bluff of black stone which Relvain was climbing. The Assassin scouted it out and found two cave entrances, each guarded by over 10 Githyanki.

Shadowfox told them the Githyanki scouts showed very little aptitude for guarding the cave.

“Although right now they do seem to be doing a good job of beating the pulp out of her,” the Dragonpinner told herself.

With no patrols in sight, the Revenant had clear run of the trails that wrapped around the black stone bluff on both sides, easily spotting two caverns that might be entrances into some sort of complex within. The Freeriders took one and they took the other.

Nox had alreadry reached the top and was clearing out the weaker guards when she got to the top. Andrea was surrounded, guarding the unconscious form of Shadowfox.

“I hope she’s faking it,” she told herself as she waded in. "This looks like a job for a fighter.

The mist around him was virtually impenetrable, but after burying the murder weapon, Roland The Betrayer found it was beginning to clear. Suddenly it parted, and he found himself standing atop a hill. Similar fog-capped hills surrounded a jungle valley that stretched before him. To his left, a massive waterfall fed a river winding a serpentine path across the valley floor.

Nox Rhasgar found some of the weaker guards were pretty easy to kill, so he cleared them out using both his Ignition blasts and his firebreath. Two of them proved to be a little tougher.

One had Shadowfox trapped in an alcove. Shadowfox was garroting him, but let him go without doing much damage.

Nox told her to retreat to the shadows. After finishing off the weaker guards, Relvain did something with her shield that convinced both of the tough ones to rush her. She kept them busy.

“Two with one shot!” he said, as he was able to power two Elemental Bolts to kill both of them at once.

Searching the bodies, they found:

3,500 gold pieces, which Andrea put in her Platinum Pouch;

a crystal globe set with adamantine filigree;

a Jeweled mithral-mesh dagger scabbard; and

three Potions of Vitality.

At the top of some stairs, they found a door. No traps, no lock. Beyond, they found a small landing with a lot of rotting corpses.

Shadowfox was scouting ahead by crawling along the ceiling. Down some more stairs, they came to a turn-off to the right.

Shadowfox heard some voices coming from the turn-off, so the Assassin headed toward them.

Andrea insisted they following her closely. “Remember what happened when she got ahead of us before,” she told them.

When Nox got to the bottom of the stairs, however, he could not help being repulsed by the smell which emanated from the corridor Shadowfox had taken:

A New Shadowfox...

…Makes her Appearance

Andrea Ravn found no further treasures as she ransacked the wizard’s library. History of the Fabled Realm might prove valuable but this did not appear to be where Acererak stored his spellbooks.

They decided to make their way up to the next level of the manor house.

Nox noticed Shadowfox was lagging behind. When they all turned around to see what was wrong, the Assassin staggered back into the library, so they followed.

She grabbed the skull of the fallen naga, and held it next to the masque on her shoulder. She seemed to think the skull — from which the masque was made — looked like the naga’s skull, but the others could not see the resemblance. But Andrea noticed something: Both skull had latent magic on them. And the magic seemed to have the same flavor — at least to Andrea.

Then Shadowfox began to shake, and collapsed unconscious. They tried to heal her, but she remained unconscious. Andrea found a letter in Shadowfox’s clothing.

Reading the letter, Relvain saw it was from Amyria and seemed to be addressing all of them. Andrea wondered why Shadowfox hadn’t mentioned it.

“I guess we were pretty busy fighting the Bone Naga when she caught up with us,” the Warlord thought. “It must have slipped her mind when the fight was over.”

They decide to take Shadowfox down to the landing where they left Andrea’s Trihorn Behemoth. Relvain carried her. And Andrea brooded: “We’ll have to come back here when we leave to take her back to our own time.”

They found traps — of course, they found traps — starting with a spike trap. Andrea got a table from the wizard’s laboratory and used it to bridge the spikes. They found some suspicious holes in the floor ahead, so she used the table again to trigger this trap.

But the spikes or poison gas they were expecting did not emerge. Instead, gouts of flame set the table afire. Andrea had to throw it into the central shaft of the stairwell. They jumped, flew, and strolled — in the case of Nox — past the flames.

Andrea warned the others not to mention Acererak’s future when they tried to convince him to give up the rest of his Sky Metal. “It may help us convince him we are from the future, but he will be less likely to part with the metal if he knows he will need it for his necromancy.”

As they climbed to the top level of the building, she heard Acererak’s voice ring out.

“I offer you one chance to avoid my wrath, you cowardly thieves.”

She saw the robed figure had not turned or even paused in his work. He was turning dials and whispering words of power that Andrea could not really hear — but she felt them within her bones. She was able to hear his demand:

“Throw yourselves from my tower, and I shall allow fate to determine whether you live or die. “Otherwise, prepare to truly understand why I am numbered among the greatest wizards of Bael Turath.”

But Relvain quickly stepped in with some diplomatic flattery, telling Acererak they were from the future and — in the future — he was known all over the world, not just in Bael Turath. Nox followed up with a grand bluff.

Andrea knew they had to convince the wizard they were from the future. She had studied the model for his Tomb of Horrors and knew it varied somewhat from what he had eventually built. The historical record of the tomb’s traps was very extensive. So she pointed out the differences.

“Some of those changes … I was already considering,” Acererak told her. “And the others … I shall now consider. They seem like good ideas. I have to admit, this does suggest you may be from the future.”

They made their way through the slime traps and now faced the wizard across a causeway covered with glowing sigils. He had acknowledged their presence enough to turn and face them directly. He seemed genuinely interested about what they could tell him about the future. And Relvain seized on his interest to Bluff him with a story about his future.

They all turned and saw Shadowfox walk up the stairs, wearing her masque. Acererak greeted her warmly: “Hello, Nightshade.”

Nox Rhasgar did not know why Shadowfox was wearing her masque, but it didn’t seem to be driving her crazy.

The stairs had led them up to an open tower room, the walls alternating between solid stone and open slits that looked out upon the nearby city. The floor of this room ran inside these outer walls, leaving the center as an open shaft which dropped to the bottom of the tower far below.

The floor of the uncovered causeway leading to a second tower. Nox was pretty sure the glowing sigils on the crossing indicated some kind of magic trap.

Against the wall behind Acererak was a massive device of glowing orbs, rotating arms, and crystal tubes, almost filling the eastern wall. He could see the remaining pieces of Sky Metal clearly visible with the device’s internal structure. They only needed two more and they would be able to give Obanar enough Sky Metal to make one of the Implements of Argent for each of them.

“All right. You have convinced me you are from the future. But you are still thieves. They still have thieves in the future, right?”

Andrea admitted there were still thieves in the future. “But we are here on an important mission, important even to wizards as powerful as you are in the future. We are trying to save the city of Argent, which in our time is under assault by forces which seek to return the world to the chaos of the Primordials. The Primordials will have no use for powerful wizards in the future they seek to bring about.”

Then she pointed to one of the pieces of Sky Metal in the device behind the wizard and explained to Acererak how he could replace that piece without using any Sky Metal.

“Very impressive,” the wizard admitted, waving arm an arm. At his gesture, the sigils stopped glowing.

Assuming this meant the traps on the causeway were no longer active, Nox walked across the causeway and examined the device more closely. Using similar logic to Andrea’s, she told the wizard how to eliminate the need for the other piece of the Sky Metal.

“That’s all well and good,” the wizard admitted. “Just because you have proved I could give you the Sky Metal, however, hardly proves that I should give you the Sky Metal!”

Shadowfox — or Nightshade, as Acererak kept calling her — seemed to be be on their side in the argument with Acererak. She called him a fool and tried to intimidate him into giving them the Sky Metal.

That did not seem to work, but Nox noticed that he did seem slightly disturbed by the masque she was wearing.

While he and the others tried to gain some Insight into what could move Acererak to give them the metal, Relvain poured on the Diplomacy to convince him that the future would be good for a great and powerful wizard, but only if it was not controlled by the Primordials.

This was enough to convince the wizard to give them the last two pieces of Sky Metal they needed. He had Nox and Andrea help him fix his device so that it could continue to function without the two pieces and then handed them over.

They went down the stairs to where they left the Trihorn Behemoth and Shadowfox, The Assassin was still there, where they left her, and she was still wearing the masque … on her shoulder, not on her face.

Going back to the portal in the foyer, they used the gem Qwor had given them to return to their own time.

Belinda brought Avenglen and Garen Bladerun with her to Fallcrest. They both volunteered to help her pick up the pieces of her life. Maggie showed up as well, always interested in the aftermath of an assassination. But Maggie didn’t seemed as concerned as the others about Belinda’s own feelings. Her father was dead! Roland was missing and so was Madras Kalgore. Everybody was blaming Roland and his underling, but Belinda was sure he hadn’t done it. But she dared not say so because most people still thought she had a crush on Roland. The only one who wasn’t assuming it was him was Jerath … who was the one who wrote the play about her crushing on Roland!

Relvain Blackaxe listened as Obanar described the Implements of Argent he was going to fashion for them: a ring for Nox, a scythe for Shadowfox, a helm for Andrea, an orb for Krasire…

… and armor for the Dragonpinner. She was really looking forward to that. Obanar said he would look through the Archives of Argents for some designs he remembered. He assured Relvain they were dwarven designs, inspired by their God of the Forge.

They told Obanar they would be back soon to use the implements he was making to break the siege of Argent. They did still need to take care of the errand in the Letter from Amyria before they could tackle the seige. Obanar sent them back to Overlook.

Nox took them back to the secret shop where his friend sold Wondrous Items. They picked up some Restful Bedrolls and Andrea looked at some quills she remembered seeing. It turned out they couldn’t do quite what she wanted. Relvain found a smith who didn’t have exactly what she was looking for. She had to settle for another axe.

Then they were off to check out the outpost which was worrying Amyria.

Turned out to be quite close to one of the secret portals which Cachlain told them were being used by the Githyanki. They weren’t being attacked. Yet they were reporting unusual Githyanki activity in the area.

...A Bone Naga...

…How to Read

As soon as Andrea Ravn saw the glowing eyes of the skull on the top shelf of Acererak’s library, she yelled “Charge!” and ran toward it. That might have been why she failed to notice that the pile of bones between two of the bookshelves was undulating in a snakelike motion.

Nox seemed to notice, however, and soon Andrea was caught in the Bone Naga’s aura. The undead creature was able to daze the Warlord with both its rattle and its swaying, hypnotic motions.

Then a Sword Wraith stepped through one of the walls, and she knew they were really in trouble.

“At least they’re all undead,” Andrea told the others, noting the radiant energy she had put on her sword seemed to be working well when she hit them.

But the creatures seemed to be able to keep them all dazed and dictate who she was hitting.

Then they realized the wraith was healing itself. Nox managed to get free of the naga and position himself on the far side of the room and concentrate his fire spells on the wraith — with a little left over for the naga.

“We’re getting our butts kicked,” observed Nox Rhasgar as he tried to get out of the spells of the Bone Naga. The creature’s Death Rattle kept them dazed while Acererak’s Sword Wraith and Flameskull kept hitting them. And even when they got outside its range, the others could still be dazed by the swaying motion of its most powerful attack.

Shade was handicapped by the Death Sway of the Bone Naga more than the others. She had to concentrate all her effort on maintaining her Shadow Form.

The Shadow Form was good at preventing her from getting hurt, but she needed help getting out of the aura of the Death Rattle and the Death Sway.

And she wasn’t getting that help from her teammates. Not that she had helped them much earlier when she forgot to tell them about the Letter from Amyria. She told herself, “It just slipped my mind,” as she remembered how excited she had been to see the laboratory.

She knew that on its tables someone might have fashioned a bone masque much like hers. Or, hidden in this library, might be the answer to all her questions about about the masque and why the Raven Queen gave it to her.

But for now Shade was just frustrated by the naga. Constantly dazed by its rattle and swaying dance, she could do little except pile her shrouds on the creature and concentrate on maintaining her Shadow Form.

Usually, Shade was able to escape from such predicaments by slipping from shadow to shadow. But in this dazed condition she couldn’t manage that without giving up what she thought of as her true form.

Finally, Relvain convinced her to abandon the protection of the Shadow form. Still, even after she slipped away into the shadows, the creature was able to frustrate her. All it had to do was edge toward the shadow where she was hiding and she was dazed again by its Death Sway.

“I’m telling you,” Jerath insisted, “it doesn’t make sense. Roland was a sneaky bastard, and he clearly was taking orders from Tiamat. But he could have killed Markelhay without anybody knowing. He was angling to marry Belinda and take over as Lord Warden one day. Why would he kill her father in a way that made it look like he did it?”

“I wonder if I could use this bookcase as blocking terrain,” thought Relvain Blackaxe as she remembered what she did to the dragon Chillreaver.

Using her shield to trap the naga against the books, she was able to hold it there against all its thrashing efforts to free itself.

“The creature is strong,” she observed. “But it has no training in Athletics. So it cannot use its strength. And it is dextrous. But with no training in Acrobatics, it cannot use its dexterity.”

Relvain was still dazed by the rattling, but all she had to do was hold on and maintain the pressure her shield had on the naga’s neck. The rest were all able to edge out of the influence of the rattles and kill the wraith and then the Flameskull.

The naga never did break the hold. Chillreaver had broken it — but Chillreaver was an Exarch of Tiamat. The two-headed white dragon was able to flee Icehome once Krasire broken its mirrors and destroyed her iceberg.

After they killed the wraith and the skull, Nox and Shadowfox — and even Andrea — were able to pile on enough damage to kill the naga.

They found some old tomes in the library the magic-users insisted would have considerable value if they brought them back to their own time, but Andrea insisted they keep looking.

The Warlord was convinced the bookcases along one wall concealed a hidden door. She seemed to think the blue gem was telling her of a secret room where another piece of Sky Metal might be hidden.

Sure enough, persistent searching found section of bookcase that swung inward and revealed a room filled with statues. And in the middle they saw a piece of the strange metal on a pedestal.

They were nervous about the statues, but they got the Sky Metal out without problem. Then they went back to the stairwell to climb to the next level of Acererak’s manor house.

...Turns Out to Have Clues...

…About his Future.

Obanar had told her she needed to get in touch with the rest of the Order of the Black Feather to make it back to her own time. They had a blue gem which could be used to teleport through time.

She searched several wings and came up empty. No secret doors revealed their secrets. When she moved further from the main entry, a trap in the floor shot lightning bolts at her: No damage, but she sure jumped.

Past the trap, she found a door partially blocked by Andrea’s Trihorn Behemoth. She managed to forced the door open without pushing the creature into the pit beyond.

“At least I know I’m on the right path,” she told herself.

And soon she heard sounds of a fight.

Roland pulled the bloodstained dagger from the Lord Warden’s body. The orders from Tiamat were still in his hand. The next thing he knew he found himself standing atop a fog-capped hill. Similar hills surrounded a jungle valley that stretched before him. He buried the dagger where no one could find it. But he could not bury the orders from the Queen of Treachery: They were no longer in his hand when he found himself in this strange domain.

He first got through the door by teleporting past it. The gargoyles made him nervous, but it turned out they were not alive, just traps. When Andrea broke open the door to rescue him, flames came shooting out of the mouths of the stone statues, but she was able to withstand the flames.

Still, he was surrounded by two Boneclaws before Andrea could get to him. The Warlord was barely able to keep him alive as the Boneclaws attacked with their reach. And the Skeletal Guardians seemed to be able to get their attacks off more often than they should.

Usually on Nox.

They explained their theories on what was triggering the attacks to Relvain when she got there. But then another one appeared and Andrea became convinced they were creating the arcane creatures.

Relvain began beating her shield in a war-like rhythm and they all turned toward her. First one Boneclaw went down and then the other. Then they surrounded the skeletal figures.

“I guess Acererak is already turning to necromancy, judging by the nature of his minions.”

“I get it,” Andrea Ravn told the others. “We’re not creating them when they pop out of nowhere. They must have been created specially for wizards and sorcerers. Whenever Nox casts an arcane spell, they teleport right next to him.”

Once they finished off the skeletons, they searched the room.

“Obviously a workshop,” Andrea observed. The evidence of necromantic experimentation was all around them, especially in the partially dissected troll on one of the tables.

Andrea found plenty of residuum for her rituals.

“I may not have a lot of them, but this will enable me to do them more often.”

The blue gem glowed brighter whenever they moved it toward the southwest — or what they presumed was the southwest from the position of the late afternoon sun coming through the windows.

And, when they took it into the back room, it just pointed them back toward the stairwell.

Then they found a hallway that led back to the stairwell — at a higher level — and to the wizard’s library. Andrea burst in and saw two piles of bones among the books. But it was a skull with glowing eyes that attracted her attention.

...To Protect Two of Acererak's...

…Pieces of Sky Metal.

Krasire made his way to the Necropolis and found the gate open. Inside he found the tomb of Qwor standing wide open as well.

The maze proved fairly easy for him to navigate because he was able to detect the magicks which had lead the others through.

He found them standing in the burial chamber, surrounded by traps. With the help of the others, he was able to see a path through the traps. But Andrea set off one of the traps.

Fortunately they were all able to hold their breath long enough for the acidic gas to dissipate. Then Nox noticed the chamber was laid out in the pattern of Erathis’s Grand Bastion in the capital city of ancient Nerath. This enabled him to figure out the safest path to the other side.

There they found a door which allowed them to enter Qwor’s Inner Sanctum.

Jerath listened to Grigore’s rantings with growing concern. He did not need his patron going off the deep end. “I know it looks suspicious. And I dislike Roland as much as you do. But trying to convince Belinda he’s too old for her and accusing him of murder are two different things. We have to be sure.”

“Why do you disturb my rest?” Qwor’s ghost asked them.

Nox knew that Andrea’s diplomacy would be crucial, so he helped the other Dragonborn explain that they needed to reforge the Implements of Argent for the new challenges that threatened the pivotal city.

“Why should I aid you?” the ghost asked next. “Are you worthy of the Silver Cloak?”

Krasire explained they had defeated one of Tiamat’s Exarchs — a dragon, as it happens — and killed another. Nox and Andrea helped out by explaining the challenges ahead and the immediate danger to Argent.

Finally convinced, Qwor’s ghost said, "I can see how the Implements of Argent can aid you in these dangerous situations. Unfortunately, rare metal that falls from the sky is required to craft the Implements.

“The only set I know of was lost when a group of champions disappeared into the Abyss more than a century ago.”

When Nox asked what they could do, the ghost continued:

“The only option is to go to the last place where the metal was known to be — Bael Turath, approximately 600 years ago. Within my sarcophagus, you shall find a gem. Be careful of the trap, however.”

Krasire told Nox he knew the wizard — Acererak was his name — who built Bael Turath. But he met the necromancer much later than that, after he had turned to evil.

Then Andrea set off the trap in the sarcophagus, trying to get at the gem. Once again their endurance saved them.

“You’re the one who told me Roland and Juliette would convince Belinda Roland was a danger to her!” Grigore Goldforge yelled at Jerath. “Look how that backfired. Now half the women in Sayre think they’re the most romantic couple in all the planes. Even some of the sensible dwarf women in Overlook!”

“One piece of the sky metal is required for each of the Implements of Argent you wish to craft,” the old man told her.

They assembled in the portal on the plaza.

“Remember that the gem shall guide youto where the sky metal is stored,” Obanar explained. “When you are ready use the gem as the focus of your Argent Portal ritual, and you shall return here, to this time.”

Obanar had a warning for them.

“The past is not a place for you to linger, and you shall not be able to range beyond the place where the sky metal waits. Defend yourselves, but do not try to change that which has already occurred.”

After a flash of light from the circle in the plaza, Andrea found herself standing in another circle, apparently located in the entry-hall of a large manor house. One wall was lined with statues. Andrea thought she saw one of them move slightly, as it were observing their presence.

By noting whether the blue gem glowed more or less as they moved in various directions, they found two secret doors. Once again, Andrea’s lockpicking skills were insufficient to open them. “Where is Sam when we need him?” she asked herself.

Krasire was able to get inside the secret rooms — hidden behind the doors — and find two pieces of sky metal. There were traps on the floors but he avoided them and used his new boots to teleport slowly and carefully in and out of the rooms.

A similar exploration of another locked room found only hideous monsters trapped in magical cages. The blue gem was all it took to lure Krasire into another floor trap.

When he stepped on it, several of the statues sprang to “life.” And a lightning trap zapped him good.

“if you can consider Warforged ‘alive’,” she thought.

Andrea herself got trapped behind one of that same trap because she didn’t expect the lightning to go off again. She had to fight the battle without doing much tanking.

“But my healing skills still work,” she said. “As long as the others get close enough for them to reach.”

She was impressed with Krasire’s damage. The Psion was hitting almost as often as Nox.

...To Show them Where Quor...

…Is Buried.

When Andrea Ravn took Nox to Nine Bells, she noticed the district was much cleaner than the last time she was here. Some of the beggars were sweeping the streets and even the temples looked less woebegone.

They it located in a narrow building. At first, it appeared to specialize in common goods such as rope, tents and bedrolls. But it didn’t take long before Nox figured out that the proprietor — a large half-elf named Myra Edgerton — would show them more interesting things if he flirted with her first.

As she watched the dawning awareness in his eyes, the younger Dragonborn turned to her with something akin to fear. She could almost read his thoughts: “I. Don’t. Know. What. To. Do.”

She was really proud of the kid from the swamp, though, as he steeled himself and decided to bluff his way through it.

“He’s not bad at it either,” she thought to herself as Nox started to flirt with Myra. It occurred to her that the difference between pretending to flirt and actual flirting is not all that great. “I guess a flirt is kind of a bluff in any case.”

At the end of a long, narrow hallway, Myra moved a hidden switch and a door swung inward. Beyond, they found a circular room with a large, ornately inscribed teleportation circle set into the stone floor. Around the outer wall stood display cases and box, desks and large cabinets.

A pile of Restful Bedrolls spilled out of the largest of the ornately carved wooden boxes. The pigeonholes in one of the desks seemed to be each occupied by flints. A silver chime, a flag marked with martial runes, a leather pouch embosed with platinum, and a fancy stylus was displayed in one of the cases.

Asking about their wondrous properties and cost, Andrea settled on the flag. “If we don’t find something better I’d really like that I may just pay the 1,000 gold pieces she is asking.”

Although the Platinum Pouch was tempting as well. “If we don’t find a Bag of Holding, I may have to settle for that.”

She told Nox he might be overdoing it with his flirting. “You may be promising more than you’re ready to deliver,” she whispered to the Sorcerer.

Myra muttered something under her breath, and they suddenly found themselves in another room. This one was octagonal. Crystalline windows revealed they were now on a floor above the other buildings in the section of town where Elyas had sent them.

Andrea could see out in all directions. Exquisite pieced of artwork adorned most of the other four walls. But the thing which drew her eyes was a finely crafted cabinet of polished rare wood with crystal shelves. Displayed in this Dazzling Showcase, she saw five more art objects, including a fan and an opal lozenge.

A small skull made of an unidentified metal floated in the middle of room. It followed Myra around the room, occasionally turning towards her as if expecting a question.

Once Nox diplomatically convinced the half-elf he wasn’t planning to spend the night with her, he got her to show him a piece of coal which was tinged with red. He spotted the rune for fire deep inside it and was able to identify it as a Stone of Flame — a Wondrous Item that Relvaine had told him of.

He bought it on the spot, along with a black metal flask.

“I didn’t know he had that much money,” Andrea said as Nox handed over the 18,000 gold pieces Myra asked.

Now Myra took out a small vial of ink and poured it on the floor in the middle of the room. The blackness spread out in a perfect circle, passing beneath their feet and other obstacles as if they were not there.

The floor disappeared and they floated to the dark floor 20 feet below. She showed them nine more Wondrous Items, but they could afford none of them.

“The Alliance will be honored accept your appointment of Druemeth Goldtemple to the Council. We will be glad to see him assume his duties as soon as he finishes his diplomatic mission to Cachlain.”
— Krasire to Inzira,
The Daughter of the Frostwhite Forest

When Nox Rhasgar thought back on his experience flirting with the half-elf, he realized that it wasn’t as hard as he thought it would be. He had smiled at her, laughed at her jokes — even when he wasn’t sure he totally got them — and teased her a little.

In fact, as he thought back on it, he realized that some of the Dragonborn girls he knew back in the swamp might have been under the impression he was flirting them as well. He certainly smiled at them when they smiled at him. He even teased them a lot.

And the way some of them giggled when he laughed at their jokes…maybe he wasn’t getting all those jokes either.

Stepping through the Argent Portal, all memories of playful Dragonborn girls were brushed from his mind. He found himself standing in an ornately beautiful city.

Old, but beautiful.

It stood almost empty, apparently under siege. Defending it was a strange race of lion-like humanoids. One of them came up to them and introduced himself as Rrowthar who took them to an old man named Obanar.

Obanar told them about an undead guardian who haunts the Necropolis in the city. “Seek him out and see if he will tell you how to find the Sky Metal.”

As Rrowthar took them to the Necropolis he handed them a key and told them the Sky Metal was something which could help them make some artifacts which might help them.

The key opened the massive gate in the wall surrounding the Necropolis. Beyond the gate, they found the Necropolis even more silent and still than the near-empty city. A sense of hushed reverence hung in the air.

A cobblestone path wound between crypts and large, elaborate mausoleums. As they searched for some indication of where Guardian Qwor was interred, an undead creature with a longsword appeared from around one of the ancient tombs.

“What business do the living have…” it pointed its sword toward them “…in this land of the dead?”

The blade glowed with dark energy.

“What do you know of the honor of the Champions of Argent?”

Nox listened as Andrea recounted the history of the Dragonborn people — all three of them were Dragonborn — and saw the Wight seemed to be impressed.

So he decided to try to intimidate the creature. That went well as the Wight cowered a bit at his threats.

“Prove you are worthy to wear the Silver Cloak,” it thundered.

Andrea stepped forward again and explained diplomatically all they had done. Nox could see the creature was receptive to such entreaties. So he put aside his plan to prove himself worthy by demonstrating his athletic prowess and continued the diplomatic overtures.

That was all it took. The Wight bowed to him and pointed toward a mausoleum.

“That is where you will find Qwor buried.”

“I always knew that bastard was no good,” raged Grigore Weatherbie Goldforge when he found out Faren Markelhay had been murdered. Apparently Roland and Kalgore disappeared before the killing was discovered. “But not before the killing. Everything Roland was, he owed to the Warden of Fallcrest. And this is how he repays his debts. At least now Belinda will be able to see him for what he really is.”

When the key did not fit in the door, Aleeya realized it would take teamwork to solve the puzzles in the mausoleum.

Sure enough all three of them got through the door by working together.

They found a maze and split up. Without the teamwork, they got lost in the maze and had to use all their endurance to avoid becoming weakened. But pooling their arcane knowledge — a Sorcerer, a Paladin, and a Warlord have a lot of arcana between them — Andrea was able to get them back on track.

Aleeya knew the construction was magickal in nature — the place seemed much bigger on the inside — so he decided the inherent magic might provide clues as to how to navigate their way through the maze. Nox was able to help him some.

He began to the see the pattern in the way the enormous maze was magickally squeezed into the ordinary-sized crypt. “Perhap,…Yes!” He showed the others they through.

He led them into an elaborate burial chamber.

“I’ll bet it’s full of traps,” he warned the others. “These things are always full of traps.”

“You mustn’t come right out and ask her about Wondrous Items,” the Deva warned. “They are in her private collection. Flirt with her first, then she might show you the good stuff.”

“Cachlain has invited me to send an ambassador to his court to facilitate our alliance against Sangwyr. Druemmeth Goldtemple, I ask you to represent me there. Go at once. And make sure the Stone-Skinned King does not double-cross us.”
—Inzira, the Daughter of the Frost-White Forest

“We ride to the east,” Megan Swiftblade told the Freeriders. “Our scouts found tracks near an outpost there. Some evidence indicates Githyanki may be involved.”

Battle-weary, the Freeriders obeyed. No arguing, no shouting, they almost seemed beaten.

But Megan knew better. She herself felt none of the old pride. Her new pride — a kind of dedication to the Alliance — was tempered with purpose.

All the Freeriders felt that purpose, too. She knew. They would follow her into the Elemental Chaos itself.

She just hoped that was not where they were heading.

“Here is the sequence of sigils you can use to perform a portal ritual to reach my court.”
—Cachlain, rewarding the representatives of The Order of the Black Feather for their service freeing him from the clutches of an Exarch of Tiamat

“Why should I be troubled? Have I not done everything I could to restore the Temple of Erathis?”

He could not remember if he had asked the Exarch these questions, but he was sure his work in the Nine Bells district had been noticed by his god. The whole place was in much better shape than when he arrived. The other temples were being restored as well.

But it seemed in his dream that Erathis wanted more from him. The Exarch seemed to think he was needed in Argent.

...By Fire Man and Rock Girl...

…As Crowd Favorites in Cachlain’s Arena.

In the process, they expose an Exarch of The Queen of Treachery.

Andrea Ravn told the others they needed to prepare for another battle before they got to the throne room. She went about healing the others even as they were carried or hussled up through the corridors which led back up to Cachlain’s headquarters.

They were all at full strength by the time they got to the great doors.

“A good thing, too,” she thought to herself.

As soon as they got there. Sovacles began making wild accusations, charging them with crimes Andrea was pretty sure the mind-mage himself had committed.

“The gracious king invited you into his palace, and you use trickery and deceit to compromise the security of his domain. You aid his great enemy, Sangwyr, and you plot against our brave, wise king! At every opportunity, you’ve allowed them into the king’s domain and led them in their assault! Now, submit to imprisonment and the king might spare your lives.”
—Sovacles,
adviser to the Stone-Skinned King

Cain told Cachlain they were clearly attacked by the assaults Sovacles was trying to blame on them.

But the seneschal seemed to be ordering the Stone-Skinned King around, not even hiding his power over Cachlain. As soon as Sovacles shouted “Attack,” the Fomorian king charged them.

Wishing she had Krasire’s powers of persuasion, Cain concentrated her attacks on Sovacles. The rest were doing the same, although Valna tried to intimidate the king, berating him for letting Sovacles order him around. That didn’t work, but Cain thought it came closer than might be expected.

The king hesitated a second, looking angrily at his advisor. Then he shook it off and renewed his attacks on Relvain. Sometimes he was able to slam her so hard he caught others in his attacks.

Cain decided to step back and take advantage of her reach attacks to get a shot at Sovacles without setting herself up for those slams.

She noticed Nox was using smaller bursts of fire than he used against the wolves, so he he could hit the seneschal without hitting the king.

Sovacles was hiding behind Cachlain’s stone armor and deflecting as many attacks as he could toward the king himself. This seemed to convince the king their entreaties of friendship were some kind of deception.

But Andrea was actually healing the king.

“Seems to help,” Cain thought to herself. “Sovacles is getting more and more obvious. Maybe that’s helping.”

“You have no idea who you’re dealing with! My queen has given me the power to destroy you easily! Tiamat will have all that you possess and more, and your blood is my gift to her! And I’m sure Cachlain’s replacement will be more amenable to our commands.”
—Sovacles,
revealed as an agent of Tiamat

Once Relvain Blackaxe had Cachlain’s attention — “I guess the only way to get it is to hit on the head with my axe” — she adopted a defensive posture. The giant Fomorian still was able to hit her sometimes, but at least he wasn’t attacking the other.

The others were trying to convince the Stone-Skinned King that Sovacles was not his friend, but they didn’t seem to be getting anywhere. When Nox put up what what seemed to Relvain to be a pretty good argument, she thought he was about to realize what was up.

When Cachlain shook that off and renewed his attacks, Relvain decided to take things into her own hands and tried the diplomatic approach. Just when that seemed to be working, the king looked at her and said, “Yer da one ’oo ’it me.”

She told the others they were just going to have to concentrate on killing Sovacles.

As the seneschal got more and more beat up, his ranting became more irrational. Just when it appears that the advisor’s threat is ended, his body evaporated and formed into a wispy green cloud.

The cloud began cackling about Tiamat’s power and Cachlain’s replacement, and Relvain knew the trickster had lost all control…

…and was revealed as a shapeshifter.

“Replacement?” shouted the Stone-Skinned King. He leaped toward his throne and gestured at the floor, which was made of some kind of crystal formed like stained glass. It disappeared and Relvain fell to the arena below.

She managed to keep her feet and saw the green cloud Sovacles had become float down on wispy wings.

“You have destroyed my human guise! Still, I have four more forms that can defeat you easily! Now you know you face Virizan, Exarch of Her Dark Majesty Tiamat! All in this room will take my secret to their graves!”
— Sovacles,
revealed as Virizan

Valna of the Moonstair heard a cheer from below, but he did not fall with the rest. He and Nox had spread out behind the throne itself to avoid Sovacles’s bursts of Bane Quills. The floor around the throne side had not disappeared when the strange king gestured at his crystalline floor.

Looking over the edge, Valna could see that four Eladrin gladiators had been fighting a Blackroot Treant. They had managed to chain it down with Cold Iron chains and now were acknowledging the crowd’s cheers.

He could tell the gladiators thought the crowd was cheering for them. “Foolish Feydark preeners,” he thought to himself. “Anyone can see the crowd is cheering because they paid for an ordinary arena fight. Now they get to see an Exarch of Tiamat, fighting for his life against true champions, capable of fighting on his level.”

“Cachlain won’t last long! Sangwyr marches, and the Fomorian weakling’s forces can’t stop him alone. Tiamat covets this domain and it will be hers, and Sangwyr will be a perfect puppet upon the throne.”
— Virizan,
Exarch of Tiamat

Nox Rhasgar heard a new chant go up from the crowd below. Something about a dragon.

The insubstantial nature of Virizan’s Venom-Wisp form made it hard for Nox to do as much fire damage as he would have liked. But when his friends below surrounded the Venom Wisp, it was forced to change into a swarm of snakes.

Only a few of the crowd seemed to be taking up the chant about the dragon, but one of the gladiators heard it. He was now leading the chant and encouraging the rest of the crowd to join it.

“I can see that at least that one realizes they are not cheering for him,” Nox noticed. “I guess all Feydark Eladrin are not so arrogant as to think everything is about them.”

Now that the crowd was organized, he could make out the words:

“Dragon-Pinner. Dragon-Pinner. Dragon-Pinner….”

“I guess Relvain is better known around here than I thought.”

The crowd was reacting to his blasts as well. The party members who had fallen were on their feet and attacking Virizan with their weapons. Whenever they surrounded the Shapeshifter, he would turn into a swarm of snakes and it would become hard for them to hit the teeming mass.

Their blades often struck between the snakes, doing less damage than they might. But his blast attacks left no room for the snakes to squirm to. They seemed to do extra damage as the snakes got in each other’s way.

Every time this happened, the crowd seemed to cheer, only to fade into disappointment.

“I guess it’s because they cannot see me up here.”

The gladiators — ever in tune with the crowd’s mood — made the same guess they formed themselves into a kind of ladder to let Nox and Valna climb down.

Remembering nothing of the philosophical debate before they fell through the floor, Grim was impressed with the way the crowd was reacting to the Dragonborn Sorcerer’s fire attacks. When Nox killed off the swarm form, they changed their chant.

“Fire Man. Fire Man. Fire Man….”

When the Snake-Swarm form died, Virizan tried to alternate between his Venom-Wisp form and the guise of a human creature with scaled skin. In this guise, he produced his staff of office, now twisted and warped into the image of a hooded serpent.

But the Venom-Wisp soon died as well, forcing Virizan to try another form, transforming into an enormous, coiled serpent with a humanoid face. A row of green quills ran down his spine, and longer spines jutted out from the tip of his muscular tail.

This form died quickly, and the Shapeshifter had to stay in the Snaketongue form for the rest of the battle.

As the gladiators joined the winning side — Grim could see they had keen sense of whom the crowd was favoring — Virizan began to try to edge him closer to the chained tree.

The green-scaled creature had the ability to send out Emerald Coils which slid them towards the undead Blackroot Treant.

“I have no illusions that I am the strongest of Tiamat’s Exarchs. Even if you defeat me, you can’t stop us all!”
— Virizan,
Exarch of the Queen of Treachery.

“The tree has reach,” Andrea Ravn warned the others. “I think its branches can attack you if you’re with 15 feet of its trunk.”

Then she herself was grabbed by roots which emerged from the ground around her…20 feet from the trunk.

“And its roots can reach even farther!”

She could tell Virizan was close to death, but she could not reach him with her weapon. So Andrea picked up a rock and threw it at the green-scaled form he had taken.

The rock didn’t do much damage, but it was enough to kill the Exarch. The crowd started a new chant.

“Rock Girl. Rock Girl. Rock Girl…”

Freed from the spells Virizan was casting on him, Cachlain sent his guards down to bring the heroes up to his throne room. As they passed the cages where the Quicklings had released the arena beasts, Andrea noticed a rack with weapons arrayed for use by the arena fighters.

One of the weapons glowed with a red magickal power.

A Cyclops guard noticed her interest in the weapon.

“Rock Girl likes sickle?” he asked her. “I take sickle to Stone-Skinned King. Maybe he make sickle present to Rock Girl for winning in the arena.”

She was pretty sure it was no ordinary sickle. So she kept her mouth shut.

“My stupid guards!” shouted Cachlain when the guard told him where they had found the weapon. “This no sickle. This is Talenta Sharrash. Made only beneath the Dark Sun. Magic item of great power. I collect such items, but my guards had this sitting in stupid weapon rack.”

Then he turned to Andrea Ravn. “Guard says you see this magic item in rack, after you kill Virizan. Cachlain not know Sovacles really Virizan. Not know Sovacles work for Tiamat. Not know Queen of Treachery want help Sangwyr take Stone-Skinned King’s domain from Cachlain.”

After he freed Talyrin, she told him what she had learned from Valna while they were both prisoners in the secret prison. Convinced by this that Sangwyr was the true enemy, Cachlain turned to his guards.

“Prepare my armies to march. We must meet Sangwyr on the battlefield. The debt I owe those who freed cannot be fully repaid.” Striding into his personal quarters, he emerged with two more magic items from his collection.

He gave Andrea the Talenta Sharrash, which looks like a sickle on the end of a long pole.

Andrea was sure she heard the Sharrash growl when he handed it to her.

“That’s how you’ll know it is hungry,” he said, raising a stone eyebrow. “For blood.”

Then he handed her a fire-scorched wooden staff with sharp teeth running along its entire length. As a Dragonborn, she could feel its draconic power.

Finally, he bestowed a large shield on Relvain. “For the Dragonpinner.” This shield was emblazoned with an arm raised to make a defiant fist.

From the reluctance in the way the dwarf laid down her old shield, Andrea knew she might have a hard time convincing the shield maiden to use the new one in battle.

“I better take a look at its magic. Maybe it will be better than the old one.”

...and Sovacles Tries to Blame...

…Our Heroes.

When the ghost was done teaching Andrea to read her Harrow Deck, Shade wondered if she and Krasire could get information out of the Githyanki assassin tortured by Cachlain’s guards. They heard she had erased her own mind and reduced herself to an idiot.

Shade knew Krasire had powers which could penetrate minds. Perhaps the Shardmind could psychically extract knowledge Arzoa didn’t even know she had.

So they decided to sneak down to the pens where she was being held. The animals were kept their, waiting their turn in the arena. For a disabled Githyanki, the cages sufficed as a kind of jail.

“And that keeps her away from the Winter-Court diplomats housed in the secret prison with Talyrin,” she told herself.

She spotted some Quicklings releasing the arena beasts from their cages and rushed in to grab the Quicklings before too many were released. But the Quicklings were too quick for them. No sooner than they had relocked a cage but the Quicklings had it unlocked again…

…or the beast was free.

Once a Chimera, three Winter Wolves, and a Thunderfury Boar were released, the Quicklings made a run for it, leaping into the audience watching an arena fight.

Chasing after the Quicklings just got them trapped between the freed beasts and the pit which surrounded the arena.

“I will open one of the cages,” Krasire told Valna. “Then you lure the Boar in by getting it to charge you.”

By the time Nox Rhasgar got there, Krasire and Shadowfox were already hurting. Nox was glad Andrea Ravn was such a good healer. That left the sorcerer to do what he did best.

“Lay down lots of blasts of fire damage.”

The Winter Wolves who were harrying the Revenant and the Shardmind got the blasts at first. Nox tried to include the Chimera and the Thunderfury Boar whenever he could. But they were both so big they could not really mingle with the wolves.

The Chimera looked frustrated by its size as well. Once the wolves were cleared out, it was finally able to attack two targets at once. Then Nox could see why it was frustrated.

“It has three heads. It would be able to attack three targets at once if it weren’t trapped in this narrow space between the cages.”

“I have a better idea,” Valna told Krasire. “You open the cage and I will drive it into the cage with my Precise Shot arrows.” The plan failed because his arrows killed the big pig before it was driven into the cage. “I guess all that damage Shadowfox was concentrating on the Boar really weakened it.”

Andrea Ravn had to admit she was impressed with Nox’s performance. “I bet you and I and Relvain could take on anything,” she told the sorcerer. But even Shadowfox was putting out some major damage on the Chimera.

“Very concentrated damage.”

Once the Chimera realized it was bloodied, it decided to take its chance on freedom and flew out through the arena. Andrea realized the Stone-Skinned King would see it escape.

Guards were sure to be sent to investigate.

Sure enough. When the guards showed up, it looked like Andrea and her friends had let the animals loose. So the guards took them upstairs toward the throne room.

Andrea realized this was their last chance to recuperate, so she stalled and healed the rest of the party while they made their way upstairs.

As soon as they were inside the throne room, Sovacles commanded the doors to close, and they slammed closed behind Andrea.

The advisor, clearly angered, yelled, “The gracious king invited you into his palace, and you use trickery and deceit to compromise the security of his domain. You aid his great enemy, Sangwyr, and you plot against our brave, wise king! At every opportunity, you’ve allowed them into the king’s domain and led them in their assault! Now, submit to imprisonment and the king might spare your lives.”

...Looking to Transport Hostages...

…But the Hostages Show Up Uncaptured…

…and take out the agents.

Nox Rhasgar was surprised when the cyclops locked herself back into the cell where she was being held prisoner. The elf from the ambassador’s cell explained that Talyrin was once the Stone-Skinned King’s closest advisor. Apparently she was supplanted by Sovacles when the bald seneschal convinced Cachlain she was plotted against him.

The ambassadors agreed that it would look less suspicious if they remained in their secret prison with the cyclops sage. Talyrin told Nox that Sovacles was a relative newcomer to the Stone-Skinned King’s court. Apparently he arrived about three months ago and quickly wormed his way into Cachlain’s good graces.

She agreed with Shadowfox when the Assassin told her of their suspicions that Sovacles was using mental powers to influence the king.

“It’s the only way he could have turned Cachlain against me,” she told them. “This is the first of the Stone-Skinned King’s advisors to wield magic openly. He was always afraid of the power of magick. That’s why he only chose sages and powerful warriors as advisors in the past.” Looking worried, she said, “The king has changed. Sovacles’ magick is the only reason I can think of.”

As they went back towards their rooms, Nox heard noises up ahead. Rushing to the quarters where ambassadors in good standing were housed, he found the floor exploding upward as a Bullette, scarred by some horrible torture, came up out of the depths. As he and Relvain hurried ahead to fight the intruders who were pouring from the hole left by the Bullette, Nox saw Shadowfox running back to get the elf out of the secret prison.

“That guy had a really nice bow,” he thought to himself. “But I better turn myself into a ball of fire.”

Relvain Blackaxe had never seen Nox take the form of an insubstantial ball of fire before, but she was glad to see it happen.

The attackers seemed to be led by a Drider Fanglord. Besides the Scarred Bullette, she saw a few Drow Underlings, and a pair of Inferno Bats. The bats didn’t to like the fact that they couldn’t seem to hurt Nox now that he had turned himself into an elemental ball of fire.

Once Grim got the keys from Talyrin and freed Valna, she ran back to the banquet hall to get back to the invaders in their rooms. But the invaders — two inferno bats — intercepted her in the banquet hall.

So Grim made her stand there, piling her shrouds on the fiery creatures, and doing as much damage as she could. Once Valna got his bow from storage and returned, the Elf joined the fight.

Grim had to admit Valna did a better job at pinning the bats down, but they were able to tag-team them and finish them off.

A good thing, too. Because once Nox and Relvain killed the Bullette and drove the Drider off, Relvain insisted on following the Drider down the hole.

A Githyanki Assassin Interrupts...

…The Attempt to Free Elven Ambassadors…

…held in Cachlain’s secret prison.

Shadowfox told Krasire what was behind the secret door in the antechamber: a secret prison.

There she had found the missing diplomats. They told her they had been imprisoned by Cachlain at the word of Sovacles. Also in the secret prison: a former advisor to the Stone-Skinned King and a gnome named Legbreaker.

Krasire decided to take Nox to free the ambassadors, but Shadowfox insisted on exploring further. So he invited Bram Ironfell as well.

They found the lock too hard to pick, so they decided to try to break the cell door. No sooner than they started beating on it, though, and they were attacked by a Githyanki assassin and her Purplespawn Nightmares.

It didn’t take long for these creatures to gain the upper hand. They were quick and hard to hit.

Shade found a massive cavern, surrounded by a 10-foot-wide chasm below the king’s throne room. An arena was built on the vast, flat pillar of bloodstained purple crystal. She also found animal pens nearby. After scouting the area for a while, she heard someone being brought downstairs. “Another fighter for the king’s pleasure” was all she could guess.

it felt to Nox Rhasgar like he was the only one doing damage to these creatures. He was glad he could hit them — sometimes — but they had blooded all of them before he really got going.

And they were all making a lot of noise. The prisoners — except the gnome — were helping. But even the attempt to to open the prison cell had made a lot of noise.

Sure enough, before they had even bloodied the nightmare, the Stone-Skinned King’s guards showed up and yelled, “What’s the meaning of this?”

Fortunately, Bram Ironfell — who seemed to be a diplomat who used to work for the Githyanki — was a quick thinker.

He shouted, “We caught this Githyanki — she claims her name is Arzoa — trying to free these elves.” Then he ordered Nox to seize Arzoa.

Nox picked up on the ploy — shifting the blame for the jailbreak attempt to the assassin — and attacked her. He was even able to help the guards take Arzoa up to the throne room.

Sovacles seemed nonplussed by the whole affair. So surprised that he let the king make up his own mind what to do with the trespasser. Cachlain threw them into the dungeons, obviously anxious to use the Purplespawn in his arena.

...with Invitations Sent...

…by the Githyanki.

“Did you think to poison a dwarf with your sleeping draughts?” she mused, as Droeth turned into an Oni. “And Krasire here doesn’t even have a mouth. How did you imagine he might succumb to your poison?”

Then the guards attending the Githyanki ambassador transformed as well. Relvain could see from the look on his face — as he sniffed at his food — that he had never known his guards were Rakshasa: a race usually allied with the pirates of the Astral Plane, the Githyanki.

Bram Ironfell knew the food was poisoned as soon as he tasted it. He also knew something more terrifiying: The Githyanki had betrayed him. Droeth transformed into an Oni Spiritmaster, enough to suggest the Githyanki were behind the poison by itself. When his own guard transformed into Rakshasa Warriors, he knew Emperor Zetch’r’r was behind it. The Githyanki overlord had enlisted Bram in his plan to bring war and conquest across the planes. “What manner of betrayal is this?” he demanded. But the Oni only laughed about how slow his diplomacy was proceeding.

Krasire decided to show the Spiritmaster just how powerful diplomacy could be: He used his Keys to the City power to convince Bram Ironfell that being an ambassador to an emperor who would poison his own diplomats was not a worthy title.

He suspected Bram might have long harbored doubts about working with the Githyanki. Apparently the Emperor Zetch’r’r harbored doubts of his own. Krasire knew what a prize the Seed of Winter might be. And the portals the emperor sought to use in the domain of Cachlain were valuable as well.

With the Oni Spiritmaster laughing in Bram’s face, it probably wouldn’t have taken much to convince the ambassador to renounce his post and fight on behalf of the Alliance…

…even knowing the Alliance itself might never forgive his treason.

But the Masked Lord — Krasire — offered the dwarf the Keys to the City of Waterdeep anyway.

And that sealed the deal.

Then he turned to wake up Shadowfox.

Who was still snoring in his salad.

Belinda still hadn’t told her parents about Jerath’s — very public — offer. Asking her to star in his next production might be just what they wanted: a way to keep her close to Sayre and away from the action. Then again, maybe they would forbid it. Theatrical people had a bad reputation in some places — not Sayre, of course. They might think it inappropriate for a Lord Warden’s daughter. Belinda was not sure which reaction would make her madder.

All Cain could remember was the Githyanki ambassador accusing the Droeth of betrayal — Droeth? the laconic Cyclops had transformed into a Oni of some sort before the accusations started flying.

Now Krasire was slapping her, and the banquet of ambassadors had erupted into a brawl…

…with the Githyanki ambassador some how on their side.

“This is my kind of dinner party,” she thought as she saw four Howling Spirits appear behind the Oni.

They took down the Oni — a Spiritmaster, apparently — first. The Oni consumed its Howling Spirits even faster than they were able to kill them. “Doesn’t pay to be the minion of an evil master,” she thought.

After that they concentrated on the Rakshasa and took them down one at a time. Cain noticed Relvain was doing a good job of convincing all of the Githyanki agents to attack her. And fending off those attacks most of the time.

“Good to have a talented tank.”

Searching the bodies they found 300 platinum pieces and a Circlet of the Resolute Mind, which left Krasire facing the difficult choice as to which of his two headpieces he should wear.

...A Crazy King Meets a Cray-Cray Diplomat...

…To the Frustration of Sovacles…

…and of a certain shieldmaiden.

Relvain Dragonpinner was trying to come up with some way to use her fighting skills to impress The Stone-Skinned King in the gladiatorial arena. But Sovacles — obviously a mind-mage controlling the king somehow — kept frustrating her efforts…

…to say nothing of the revenant-assassin.

Shadowfox kept doing things which seemed totally inappropriate to Relvain. Just things one doesn’t do in situations. Like eating a coin. Or jumping into an acrobatic routine.

And yet these demented actions seemed to impress the king more than the rational alternatives the Dragonpinner was offering.

First, when the king appeared distracted by the gladiatorial combat in the arena below, the assassin got his attention by executing acrobatic stunts. Soon the king was clapping and Sovacles was sulking.

Then Shadowfox tried to intimidate Cachlain.

Sovacles blustered, “Threats will not work against the king.”

But Relvain could see the king was shaken. “Perhaps his paranoia makes him susceptible to intimidation.”

Then Shadowfox did something that really got Relvain’s goat. She convinced Krasire to give the Seed of Winter to the king.

“You didn’t even get anything in return,” she fumed. But the king seemed genuinely impressed with the gift. “Even though he thought it was his in the first place. And how are we going to get it back to give to the Daughter of the Frostwhite Forest?”

Bluffing about the danger posed to the king by the Githyanki, Relvain finally began to make some headway. “I guess I was right about his paranoia.” After a failed atttempt at diplomacy by Shadowfox, she bluffed again with even more success at provoking the paranoia in the king’s mind.

Cachlain’s interest returned to the gladiators — Relvain had been unsuccessful in provoking Sovacles to a duel in the arena, but there was still fighting going on down there. So she tried to do with athletic swings of her axe what she had seen Shadowfox do earlier with his acrobatics.

Unfortunately, she dropped the axe and the remained intent on the gladiators below.

Sovacles said, “The king has had enough of your chatter. Leave the court at once.”

The king did not seem to be paying attention, but offered no disagreement. As they were leaving, they saw Bram Ironfell — an old friend of Storm Johnson — go in and arrange for them to be able to stay in the ambassador’s quarters.

During these sessions where Sovacles came down to her cell complaining, Talryn always remembered the visions she had of her betrayal. In those visions, it always seemed that Delis Erinthal was the only one who could save her. Now the betrayal was real. And somehow the visions seemed more real as well. Today Sovacles was boasting about some audience with the king, about how he had foiled some diplomats who seemed to be set on upsetting the agreement with the Githyanki.

Trinity Shadowfox had plenty of time to get to know Bram Ironfell after the dwarf arranged for them to stay. Bram entertained them with tales of closing the gates to the Elemental Chaos.

When talked turned to his family, though, Bram became bitter. His family’s decision to exile him from their estates really grated on him. Though he was a hero in Overlook, his family’s betrayal — over him doing the right thing — convinced him that the Alliance would never stop the Githyanki.

So he had joined them.

Indeed, he was acting as the Githyanki ambassador to Cachlain’s court. He had already procured the right of the Githyanki to use the portals to pass through the Stone-Skinned King’s domain.

Bram invited them to a formal dinner later and Cain accepted. At the dinner, they met other ambassadors they had seen around the court:

Adrianna Baelsblood, haughty Tiefling, whose slaving business works with Cachlain’s;

Troke, a Satyr of the Circle of Crownstone; and

Droeth, a laconic Cyclops who works for a relative of Cachlain named Uluh-couram.

The food was poison with some kind of sleeping draught. As he slipped into unconsciousness, Cain saw Droeth transform into an Oni Spiritmaster.

“Uh-oh,” she thought as Bram’s guards turned into Rakshasas. Bram seemed as surprised at this as she was.

“I hope one of the dwarves can stay awake,” was her last thought as her face fell into her plate.

...Into the Court of Cachain...

…Shadowfox Discovers Some Disturbing Secrets…

…about her past.

Grim was still in her full battle mode when the general came over to thank her.

“I see now why the Lady Inzira has chosen you to represent us to Cachlain’s court. Not only do your crude manners make a better fit, but you obviously can defend yourself should the diplomacy turn to— other means.” He led Shadowfox back to his tent while the rest recovered. “You have probably saved my life today. And for this you must be rewarded.”

General Goldtemple gave Grim a chest filled with gold pieces and a bag of gems.

After contemplating whether the act would offend Druemmeth, Grim ate one of the gold pieces while the Eladrin explained that he would lead them to the area where most of the entrances to the Stone-Skinned King’s court could be found.

“Your combat skills might see you through,” he explained, telling them the previous emissaries sent by the Daughter of the Frostwhite Forest had never returned.

“I fear they may no longer be alive,” he admitted. “Please try to find them. And get them released, if you can.”

“In this war, we face not only mortal danger, but a more sinister attack—an assault against our hearts and minds. The githyanki threaten to drive us to defeat through neglect and treachery. Neglect as we refuse to take the bold steps we must to survive, and treachery as our enemies lead astray those who could be our allies, and mobilize them against us.”
—Amyria,
appealing to the Coalition

Shade knew her medallion could be used to find the patrols which Druemmeth had warned her about. She had not yet decided whether she should approach the Stone-Skinned King’s guards openly or try to sneak past them with her stealth.

Shade Shadowfox was particularly proud of her stealth skills.

Once they picked a hole and entered the underground caves which led to Cachlain’s court, she found a maze. Labyrinthine caves led every which way. So she tried the medallion, which was able to pinpoint nearby life forms. Unfortunately, it pointed almost straight down. She was pretty sure it pointed at the court itself, but it didn’t tell her much about which tunnel to choose.

“I guess I’ll just have to pick the one that leads most surely downward,” she told herself. “I know the medallion will be ready to use again in a few minutes.”

Before the trinket had a chance to recharge, Shade heard voices. The words sounded like Cyclops-accented Giantish and Shadowfox was glad she heard them before they heard all the noise her companions were making.

“Especially that dwarf.”

So she decided that diplomacy was the better part of stealth and approached them openly. When she asked for directions to the Court of the Stone-Skinned King, they took the party there straightaway.

“One might even think they believe they have arrested us,” she thought to herself.

But she said nothing aloud.

“I am saddened by the loss of Lyrindel,” High Lady Ordalf told Avenglen. “She was on an important mission for us. Perhaps the more mundane — and practical — resources of the Sword Coast will be able to help. Or perhaps the gods themselves are becoming involved.”

The walls were hewn from purple crystal and supported in places with beautifully forged iron plates. The giant doors were unlocked or non-existent in most places.

As she descended into the tunnels, the air becomes cold and stagnant.

The purple crystal that formed the walls glowed faintly as they approached the court itself. Strange, vibrantly colored mosses and fungi carpeted the floors and walls, though the living quarters and common areas she passed through were scoured clean of these growths.

Slaves and their Cyclops overseers walked the halls, and she began to see a wider variety of fey as she moved closer to the heart of Cachlain’s holdings.

As she moved through the foyer into the main hall, she saw a faint light showing through purple-crystal wall on her left. In its light, she could clearly see the outline of a door.

“Secrets,” she thought.

A massive throne of purple crystal stood on the far side of the throne room. Cachlain sat there, looking them over with his grotesque eyes.

Like other Fomorians, his body was deformed, and his skin purple and covered in warts. Plates of stone are bonded to his flesh. They look almost like armor and are carved with elaborate designs.

Cain had been expecting the armor, but not the carving and inlays.

Next to the throne she saw a smaller seat, and when they entered, a human rose from this smaller chair — a slight, bald man, and carrying a staff of office. His eyes dart among them as he prepared to speak.

The most unique feature of this room is the floor. Giant panes of glass—or maybe smooth crystal—formed a window that looked down on an arena far below. She could see gladiators battling there, and she caught the king sneaking glances at the fight.

The advisor introduces himself as Sovacles, and stepped forward to ask them, “Why do you come here? And what makes you think the great king cares what you have to say?”

Noticing a faint magickal glow around the king’s head, Cain was sure the advisor was exerting some kind of arcane coercion on the king’s mind. This was born out by Cachlain’s subsequent behavior: Whenever Sovacles made a suggestion, the king was quick to adopt the same line of thinking.

Both Sovacles and Cachlain seemed interested when she explained the recent history of the Seed of Winter — the king seemed to barely remember why he had loaned it to a dragon.

After Cain entertained the king with a display of acrobatics, she began to see they would have to work together to accomplish anything during this audience: Whenever the king became distracted, someone would have to get his attention back.

As Cachlain clapped and praised her acrobatic skills — suggesting she might be a good gladiator — Cain realized the king was likely to be impressed by displays of athletics and acrobatics prowess. She surmised that he might take those he perceives as powerful warriors more seriously.

Heroes Save General Goldtemple...

…from Sangwyr’s Cronies

Relvain the Dragonpinner woke in some kind of camp. She was being tended by Eladrin healers. Other tended her companions, but she seemed to be getting the better treatment.

She remembered losing their fight with Pyradan. Not how she got to this camp.

Seemed to be some kind of battle camp. Arrows and spears were stacked nearby.

A tall, muscular Eladrin with long, dark brown hair confirmed this by his demeanor. Adorned in mithral chainmail and wearing a longsword, he’s clearly prepared for battle. He introduced himself to Relvan as Druemmeth Goldtemple. True to his name, he had streaks of gold in the long brown hair above his temples.

He asked her about the war against the Githyanki.

When Relvain explained who they were and their relationship to the heroes in that war, he apologized for sending the Firblogs after them. “I would have approached you more diplomatically had I known who you were.”

He hadn’t heard about the siege of Nefelus, so Krasire joined in to help fill him in on the details of that adventure. General Goldtemple was interested in the Seed of Winter. “I must converse with Inzira about this,” he told them as he headed for his tent. “My ruler will want to know all about this.”

When he returned, he told them, “Inzira seeks a temporary alliance with the Stone-Skinned King. It’s best if she speaks with you.”

He invited them into his battle tent and then removed a mithral medal from his chest and pinned it to the wall of the tent. Ice spread from the medal, crystallizing across a large surface, and forming the image of a female Eladrin’s face.

With long white hair and piercing, icy blue eyes, her presence seemed cold and unfeeling to Relvain. Her eyes studied the shieldmaiden as she spoke:

“The Seed of Winter belongs to me, not to you and certainly not to the Stone-Skinned King. It was a gift from Koliada to me when I was a mere child, and I have no intention of parting with it."

Her eyes turned toward her general, "However, Druemmeth has convinced me that the Fomorian and I must work together to foil the plots of Sangwyr. Use the Seed of Winter for the time being, as a tool to make a way into the King’s court. I’ll be expecting you to return it when you’re finished.

Turning back to Relvain, she said, “It’s convenient that our interests align, so you’ll be my messengers. Tell the Fomorian I do not like him, and I know he does not like me. However, Sangwyr utterly hates both of us, and we must stop his stupid uprising.”

Pointedly hinting that he thought Inzira should be sending him instead of them, Goldtemple offered to take Relvain and her companions to a place near Cachlain’s palace.

“She has sent other emissaries before you, and they have not returned. Find them if you can and have them released.” The general’s face turned grim. “Assuming they are still alive.”

Rumors coming in from the “traveling” company (currently ensconced firmly in the very permanent University Theater in Sayre) of Jerath the “Bard” suggest that the Drow’s perversity may not be limited to stealing the words of Dwarven mastersingers.
— from a handbill Murrik Ironfell was seen passing out in front of The Orb Theatre.

Shade wondered if the dream about being a praying mantis was some kind of clue as to her previous life. Seemed right somehow, but the idea she was once a mantis seemed improbable.

“Contemplating the improbable will have to wait,” she told herself. Relvain and Krasire were already deep in diplomatic negotiations with some Eladrin general. “I wonder if he knows the high-elf lady from my dream.”

The diplomacy wasn’t even over before Shade heard the sounds of battle from outside the general’s tent. Glancing outside, she saw Eladrin bodies peppered with arrows. Others seemed to have been flayed with hundreds of tiny cuts.

The Eladrin dowsed the glowing silver sigil which was providing the light in his tent. “Good,” she thought. Shadowfox did not like the idea of her own shadow — cast on the walls of tent — giving away her position to her enemies. “Strange, though, how it almost looked like a mantis.”

Rushing outside, Shade was able to find cover in some rocks. “Hard to tell who was firing the arrows.” The only archers she could see appeared to be Eladrin. Some elderly women lurked in the trees, but they didn’t look like Eladrin. Krasire shouted out that they might be witches, and Shade was convinced they had some kind of affinity to shadow.

Some of the Eladrin were armed with swords — Winter Blades, Shade seemed to recall they were known as…

But how could she, a member of the High Lady’s Summer Court…

“That was from the dream,” she thought. “The lady in the dream where I was a mantis.”

Shaking off the thoughts, she noticed the Eladrin with the swords seemed to be taking the worst of it. Those already dead were all armed with swords. Those still standing seemed to be the targets of whoever was shooting at them. She turned to one of the Eladrin archers to tell her to fire back, when it turned into a Rakshasa and fired an arrow at the general.

And one at Shade.

Meanwhile, a troll covered in vine had crashed into the back of the general’s tent and attacked those inside with a Thorny Burst. Krasire was able to immobilze the troll and one of the old women with his empowered Force Grasp. That enabled the rest of the group to get out of the tangle of brambles left behind by the troll’s attack.

“The archers are shapeshifters,” she cried and Relvain rallied the heroes to concentrate their fire on one of Sangwyr’s Night Hags — that was the form the old women shifted into when they wanted to do damage.

Seed of Winter cast aside some of its doubts. Now that the Psion had promised to return it to Inzira once the charade with the Stone-Skinned King was through, the Seed didn’t have to worry whether it had given its Concordance too easily. Still, Krasire did seem to be learning a little bit about dominating a battlefield. At least against these assassins.

Krasire Mirrorsmasher was finally getting the hang of his Precise MInd power. He just had to wait until one of his augmented powers hit, then follow it up with an unaugmented psionic powers. He realized that even an unaugmented power could do a lot if he picked the right one.

“And if it has a greater chance of working.”

Krasire used his augmented Force Grasp again to finish off the first Night Hag and start on the troll — “Twice as many targets gives me twice the chance of hitting” — so Revain began shouting they had to concentrate their fire on the troll.

Relvain was particularly worried about the Vinespeaker Troll as it appeared to be able to regenerate itself. Indeed, once they bloodied it, it healed itself completely and grew more ferocious. They had to kill it with a burning stake from the fire to prevent it from coming back to life. Once they burned the troll’s corpse, they turned to the other assassins.

It became clear Sangwyr’s minions were really after the general. The Rakshasa were targeting at least one of their shots at him every time they turned into their fighting form.

After the assassination attempt, General Goldtemple urged them to leave for the court of Cachlain at once.

Pyradan Scores a TKO

The two Portal Dogs seemed to Krasire to be doing a better job of controlling the battlefield than he was.

They teleported Relvain into the cave, but they failed when they tried the same tactic on Shadowfox and Krasire himself. This failure was almost worse than success might have been, isolating Relvain from their help.

Sure, it allowed him to keep his hippogriff, Xerxes, in the fight. But Relvain was isolated from all help. Still the Dwarven Defender seemed to be holding her own, tanking the Bloodbear inside.

But Pyradan and his dogs were able to harry them relentlessly outside the cave.

When he worked his way closer to the mouth of the cave he used his full mental powers to Force Grasp both Pyradan and the Bloodbear. Not only did this immobilize them inflicted so much damage — more than Krasire had ever dealt in a single attack — he tried it again before they could react. Seemed like a waste of a good immobilize, but it sure did a lot of damage.

Then the dogs were able to knock him out.

“Ah, the sweet surcease of consciousness,” he thought as he slumped to the ground.

Andrea Ravn remembered another moment from her dream: Zellara telling her about being trapped in the Harrow Deck. She could not get out of it until she taught another to use it. The woman’s ghost was caught in the fortune-telling deck which had been so much a part of her life.

Trinity Shadowfox was glad to see Xerxes bring his rider back to the land of the living, but the Shardmind did not seem to have his heart in the fight. Using her Ghost on the Rooftops power, she was able to evade the dogs for a while. Neither she nor Krasire ever really got inside the cave to help Relvain, who had added Bloodbear-pinning to her repertoire.

Trinity knew it wouldn’t be long before both she and Krasire would both be unconscious at the same time and she would not be able to heal the Shardmind.

“I’m glad this is not a fight to the death,” she thought. “And Xerxes can probably keep us both alive.”

“Precise Mind,” The Seed of Winter whispered. “Precissssse Mind.” But the Shardmind did not seem to want to use its Precise Mind. Still, the Seed persisted, “True domination is possible only through the Precise Mind.”

Relvain the Dragonpinner was almost sorry when she finally bloodied the Bloodbear. At first it was just a Firbolg in a bearskin. When she bloodied it, however, it turned into a giant bear-humanoid hybrid which seemed to have healed all its wounds.

Thinking it was critical to bloody it again — “I’ll bet it turns back into a Firbolg” — she threw everything she had into her attacks on the werebear, which seemed to have some kind of power of regeneration.

Even though this meant she had to ignore Pyradan and his dogs, she was able to pile on the damage faster than the Bloodbear could regenerate. The dogs were unable to get through her defenses much, but Pyradan and the werebear finally managed to wear her down.

She awoke on a makeshift altar in the war-camp of an Eladrin noble who seemed to have two streaks of gold in his hair just above his ears. He was directing his healers to bring Relvain and her companions — lying on the ground nearby — back to consciousness.

In the Feywilde

Entertaining the Skyshaper

It quickly became apparent the shadows were not just for effect. Two 12-foot humanoid hunters quickly moved to attack. Shadowfox knew that Firbolgs like shadow almost as much as she did.

“And so do those Shadow Snakes I see hiding in the shadows.”

A rumbling voice thundered through the sky. “You fight in my demesne, do you? Fine, then. Entertain me.” She quickly realized this must be the Skyshaper, the archfey Caliandra told her about.

While the Firbolgs started raining Moonfire down on them — to the delight of the Skyshaper — Grim was not convinced they were fighting all out. “Probably just testing us out,” she decided. “What are those war picks for?”

She soon found out. When they hit two different creatures with their picks in one turn, the Ghostravens could blind one of them.

Then she got a message from Krasire. Using his arcane lore, the Shardmind had figured out that the Skyshaper could be influenced by either acrobatics or flattery. “I can do both of those,” she shot back to him.

Sure enough, as soon as she started complimenting the archfey, the sky brightened slightly. This didn’t help Grim much, but she was sure it helped her allies.

And the enemies definitely didn’t like it.

Andrea Ravn remembered this dream. She’d had it before. On a mission to save some kids from a guy named Lamm. Only in this dream she wasn’t a Dragonborn. She was human. She had always failed before. This time she spotted the gnome hiding among the children before he could stab her. Andrea convinced the kids — known as Lamm’s Lambs — to turn on their oppressors. They her where Lamm was hiding, and went down and killed him. She awoke with a sense of success she hadn’t felt in days. And four trophies: a gruesome hatbox, a Harrow Deck (which probably belonged to the ghost who sent her after Lamm), a teak cigar box containing a broach with a broken clasp; and a knife inscribed “for a father’s inspiration.”

Andrea found magic on the Harrow Deck and on the broach and resolved to find out what they did. The Harrow Deck was probably for divination, but the broach could be useless until she got it repaired.

In this world or in the other.

She went to Amyria, who was recently elected to take Lord Torrance’s place leading the Coalition. The deva told her the Order of the Black Feather had been selected to take care of an important mission. She thought Andrea’s skills in that arena might be singularly useful.

So Andrea decided to try to catch up with them. She still thought of herself as more of a Golden-Scales kind of Dragonborn. But Amyria told her that Ragnar the Mighty was going along. Andrea couldn’t think of anybody as Golden Scales as Ragnar.

She found the trail of the other members of The Order of the Black Feather at the ruins of Rhest and almost caught up to them before they disappeared through a portal.

After Shadowfox’s compliments had such an impact on the ruler of this strange realm — the guy they were hoping convince to help them get to the Stone-Skinned King’s court — Krasire tried following his own advice. The sky brightened as the Skyshaper was again taken in by the flattery.

Then Shadowfox tried a different strategy: Using her acrobatics to leap to the top of one of the standing stones which surrounded them, she somersaulted out of reach of the snakes which kept shifting between them.

“Marvelous!” shouted the booming voice. And the sky brightened further.

When Krasire delivered his final compliment, Andrea saw the sun come out and heard yet another roar of pleasure from the Skyshaper.

The Shadow Snakes were not doing well under the sun’s rays. Nor were the strange creatures wearing the raven masks. Andrea could almost see smoke rising from their shadowy hides.

Except the smoke seemed to a sunshine sparkle to it.

“Like this guy likes to show off his control-of-the-sun-and-moon powers,” Andrea decided. “Almost as much as he likes flattery.”

In the heat of battle, Krasire could hear the voice of the Seed of Winter in his head, "To control is to dominate. Domination is control. See: You are now the controller. You slowed the Ghostraven with your Force Grasp. it can even immobilize, but sometimes slow is all you need. It could not get away while it was phasing, so your comrades could concentrate their damage on that one. Elimination in detail: That is what a controller can do. Just as your Kinetic Wave can push your enemies into traps laid by your allies. Just as your Betrayal can shift or slide your opponents into bunches. To control is to know just what your allies need. To dominate the battlefield is to be aware of everything on the battlefield and move the pieces where you want them to be.

When one of the snakes tried to climb the pillar where Shadowfox was acrobatically dancing out of its reach, Relvain was able to convince the others to concentrate their fire on that one. Once it was dead, they did the same to the other.

When they turned to the Ghostravens, she did not like the way the battle turned. The Firbolgs could no longer achieve true invisibility in the bright sun, but they were alternating their attacks in such a way that only one was available to attack each turn.

But Krasire finally saved the day by slowing one when it was not in a tree.

“The kid’s actually getting good,” Relvain told herself. The Dragonpinner had been frustrated as the Ghostravens kept phasing out and flying away. It prevented her from concentrating the damage on one of the two remaining opponents.

“I guess once you’ve pinned a dragon, it’s going to be frustrating to be unable to pin something as inconsequential as a Firbolg,” she told herself.

The slowed Ghostraven was unable to escape Relvain’s pin and, when the other came down to rescue it, the Shardmind caught both of them in a Kinetic Wave. Soon it was unconscious and they were able to finish off the other.

...Cachlain's Cyclops Minions Are Cornered...

…And the Kidnapped Citizens…

Ragnar the Mighty raced toward the Ruins of Rhest. The ancient city was hidden in the swamps which were gradually engulfing it.

“Where are they?” he asked. “Amyria said some revenant figured out these ruins are where the slavers they are seeking are operating from.”

Then he heard the sounds of battle.

“That’s where the blood will be,” his sword told him.

He tried to ignore it. The sword always tried to out-barbarian him. He didn’t like that much.

Running to the sound of the fighting, he found a passageway leading down into the ruins. He got there just in time to see a Stone Golem rampage through the party Amyria sent him to find. Charging in, he told himself the Golem wasn’t the only one who could rampage.

His sword agreed.

“Shut up, Wicked Fang,” he told it.

He was able to charge the Stone Golem repeatedly when Krasire — the Shardmind turned out to be a psion — forced it back toward the imprisoned citizens they had been sent to free.

Then his sword got stuck in the rocky hide of the Golem, Ragnar could see how he could twist the sword and free it. Likely hurting the stone creature in the process. "It might break Wicked Fang, though…

A smile crossed Ragnar’s face, and he twisted hard. No break, but maybe now the sword might not be so quick to call him a whiner.

The sword did not seem to mind. Almost seemed like it enjoyed the risk.

The Seed of Winter whispered, “Dominance is control of the battlefield. Not just making them hit themselves. Not just making them hit their friends. Control is dominance of the battlefield.”

Grim Shadowfox watched as her shadow detached itself from her feet and went over to stand behind the Cyclops Crusher. “That greatclub of his might have the reach of my inescapable rapier, but it will do nothing to a shadow on the stone.”

Unfortunately Shadowfox was soon separated from her shadow, unable to use it to gain combat advantage. The Stone Golem’s rampage pushed her back, but not her shadow. So she just piled on her shrouds until she could get that advantage back.

When she did, her vampiric rapier was able to channel some of the golem’s essence into her own undead being. Soon the Golem was nothing but gravel and they were able to turn to the Cyclops themselves.

Krasire pondered the Seed’s words. “What could be more useful than damaging themselves? And how could I spread my augments out longer in a big battle. I have used all my daily powers, so I will need to make the most of my mental powers for the rest of the day.”

Relvain Blackaxe was finally able to get the Cyclops Crusher up against a wall of the cave. “Not quite as fun as pinning a dragon, but effective nonetheless,” she thought.

The Cyclops’s Evil Eye was doing little to fend off the damage that Shadowfox and Ragnar were pouring on. And, of course, Relvain was doing her share as well.

“Nice to have a tank who can do some damage,” the barbarian told her.

Krasire was doing a good job of getting the two Cyclops to swing at each other, but they didn’t seem to hit very often. When they did, not a lot of damage ensued.

The Crusher did go down. And the other Cyclops — the Slaver with all the barbed nets and shuriken — headed off in a hurry.

After they searched the body, they freed the captured citizens and followed a map they found to a portal which opened with a scroll from the Crusher’s body.

Stepping through the portal, Relvain found herself surrounded by a circle of tall, columnar stones. A ring of glowing runes encircled them, but it dimmed after they arrived.

Twelve-foot-tall humanoids immediately ambushed them in the circle.

“Firblogs,” the shieldmaiden snorted. “I guess the Slaver warned them we were coming.”

...With a Little Help from her Friends

The mercenaries brought Krasire and his wounded mount back to Brindol, where they were greeted as heroes. While Quelenna Entromiel was not present — she was still politicking back in Sayre — she had arranged for a parade in their behalf.

Her agents were quick to credit Krasire for his efforts, but the mercenaries were the stars who had broken the blockade. The result was clear.

Quelenna’s gambit had succeeded.

Testing the waters with Odos, Krasire found the Githzerai leader unwilling to commit to any politics. He wanted the voting over. With Quelenna in the lead, any commitment he might make to Amyria would only prolong the voting at this point. “Maybe I can convince him once Amyria is closer to winning.”

He already had the Deva vote locked up, since he had convinced Bejam to join the council after saving Nefelus from an Exarch of Tiamat. And with the people of thinking so well of Amyria — since he had convinced them of the historical importance of religion in past wars — he was able to convince Inogo as well.

Shadowfox told him the people of Overlook seemed to be impressed with her credentials as a member of the Order of the Blackfeather, even when she told them she had only been associated with the group for a couple of days. So the Revenant went to the High Council in the dwarven city and convinced them the Black Feather was backing Amyria.

Then a stealth raid by Hobgoblins was easily foiled by the city guards. Eoffram Troyas decided to use this as proof the forces of evil were easily defeated. Trying to convince the people of Brindol that this meant his aggressive strategies would quickly pay off, Troyas made a move shore up the votes in Elsir Vale.

So confident had Krasire become with the Revenant’s abilities, that he left this gambit entirely up to Trinity. But working by herself the Revenant was unable to prove the danger of the Hobgoblins was exaggerated or even show that they were not associated with the Githyanki.

As she died, Lyrindel had a strange thought: “My soul is frozen in many pieces. My body as well. What if I split my mind as well? Legends say the swarm mind was created at the same time as the dryad mind.”

Two dragon sisters became heroes. Great metallic-dragon gods brought them to Bahamut and asked that he reward them. Bahamut told them the pair they could choose any kind of mind they wanted. The first sister said, “I will choose the mind of a tree, serene and slow, able to think a single thought for a long time.” She became the first hamadryad.

The other sister said, “I will choose the mind of the beehive, able to think many things at once.” She became the first bee swarm.

Lyrindel thought about this. “I will try to die with the mind of the swarm,” she decided. “I wonder how many ways I can split my personality before I lose consciousness.”

As Trinity shadowfox watched Krasire attempt the next round of diplomacy, she became convinced the Shardmind was going to blow it. Then she began to see the way the rock-person was able to become one of the secret masters of an entire city.

Suddenly, Quelenna was on the offensive again with another of her gambits. She had been nosing around in their finances and found the heroes who were supporting Amyria had profited substantially. “Maybe they only vote for this strange Deva because they know she will send them where they can acquire the most loot,” she suggested.

Trinity was quick to her own defense. “I have not profited at all by my association with ”/wikis/the-order-of-the-black-feather" class=“wiki-page-link”> The Order of the Black Feather," she insisted. Since none of the evidence indicated Trinity had looted anything, Trinity was off the hook.

She could see that Krasire could make no such claim. Yet he was able to overcome the accusation by promising to return the Seed of Winter to its rightful owner and to contribute his profits to the Alliance cause.

Quelenna’s second gambit was nowhere near as successful as her first, even losing some of the support she had garnered earlier.

Krasire apparently saw that Eoffram had the momentum and deftly offered Elsir Vale seat to Eoffram Troyas if Amyria got the leadership role.

“That ought to take the edge off his attacks on our candidate,” Shadowfox decided. “He won’t want to insult her too publicly if he knows he might lose the seat should she win.”

Krasire told Shadowfox he was going to talk to Fariex to see if the dragon-merchant was impressed by the way they were foiling the gambits, so she decided to talk to Inogo. Both negotiations were successful: Fariex the Scalehammer laughed heartily as he admitted he was impressed, and Inogo Dravitch was glad the council was coming to a consensus around Amyria.

Trinity turned underground, gathering rumors — and even spreading a few herself.

Turned out she wasn’t the only one taking this route. She caught wind of Quelenna’s effort to bribe some officials in Sayre. When the bribes went public, Quelenna lost the last of her non-Dornatholian support.

Desperate to stop the dangers she saw in the rash policies being advocated by Eoffram Troyas, Quelenna withdrew from the race and threw her support behind the candidate she thought would be more willing to listen to conservative ideas: Amyria!

Desperate to prove his plan’s viability, Eoffram sent out some false orders to two cities. He made it look like the Alliance Council was commanding them to raise civilian armies and strike back at the invaders. Shadowfox lit out like a banshee, using her endurance to beat the messengers to one target city.

Later she returned to Sayre and heard rumors that Krasire had taken a more leisurely pace. Even flying on his hippogriff, he got to Overlook after the messenger had presented the fake orders to the dwarves. But his masterful diplomacy managed to convince the High Council to wait for confirmation.

Which never came.

“I guess it never pays to underestimate the skills of someone who claims to be one of the Secret Masters of Waterdeep,” she said. Back out on the streets, she was able to undermine confidence in Eoffram by spreading rumors about his fake orders.

This set up Krasire for his final round of diplomacy, winning the leadership position for Amyria.

...But a Blockade Threatens...

… to Upend his Support of Amyria…

After Kalad, the paladin from Overlook was killed, Lord Torrance rushed out to avenge his death. But the Githyanki assassins had left behind an ambush, which killed Torrance himself.

With two of the top leaders dead, Amyria told Krasire the Coalition needed new leadership. After careful consideration of the alternatives, the Shardmind convinced Amyria she should run for the office.

Two other candidates had put themselves forward: Eoffram Troyas, a half-elf member of the Council in Brindol, and Quelenna Entromiel, an Eladrin merchant who rules over the settlement of Dornaithos.

Krasire believes Troyas, who hasn’t even been chosen for the Elsir Vale seat vacated by Kalad yet, is to brash and aggressive to lead the Coalition. And Quelenna is just the opposite — convinced a defensive posture will eventually win without diverting too many resources from trade.

With Bejam already backing Amyria because of Krasire’s intervention to save his island from a Winter-Court dragon who had thrown in with the Githyanki, Krasire decided to start his campaign for Amyria by targeting the respresentative of the distant city of Sherrbyr, Deacon Inogo Dravitch.

Belinda was able to open a portal to the village of one of her father’s vassals, which made his journey to Sherrbyr a lot quicker. He found a religious community open to many religions. So varied were the opinions, the entire society seemed caught up in endless debate.

Open-air forums were everywhere, so Krasire decided to take advantage of this. He set himself up on a soapbox in one of the open squares and began propounding on the history of warfare and the importance of all the various religions in that history. Didn’t take him long before he had the crowd squarely in Amyria’s court.

“That should help Inogo see the wisdom of siding with Amyria,” he told himself.

As Belinda got ready for the musical to start, a young elven lady sat down beside her. “That’s funny,” she thought. “Here I am at a play about an elven princess, and a girl sits next to me who looks just like a high elven princess.” So she started up a conversation.

Returning to Sayre, Krasire found the city in an uproar. Hobgoblin brigands were blockading trade in the Elsir Vale. The Elsir Consortium was crippled by the blockade, and Quelenna Entromiel was quick to exploit the situation for her own political gain.

“The Consortium is a competitor of mine,” the ruler of Dornaithos told the people. “But this demonstrates what I’ve been saying all along. Trade will be vital to defeating the Githyanki threat.” Quelenna announced she was hiring mercenaries to break the blockade. “Trade protects itself. I will put up the money to keep the resources flowing.”

Figuring that hiring mercenaries would take awhile, Krasire decided it was time to fly his hippogriff, Xerxes, to break the blockade before Quelenna got all the credit.

He flew out and found a few Hobgoblins blocking a bridge.

“Not much of a blockade,” he thought. “I can take them out before the mercenaries arrive. Then I can tell everyone Amyria sent me out to scout the blockade and her quick thinking and careful planning allowed me to break it quickly.”

Sure enough, he was able to kill two of the Hobgoblins with a quick Irruption of the Living Gate. The third Hobgoblin was obviously a lot tougher.

“Must be a veteran,” Krasire realized.

Hanging back and hitting the creature with his mental powers, the Shardmind was able to bloody it without taking damage. But then he got overconfident and had Xerxes swoop in for the kill.

The Hobgoblin was ready for it. With a heroic leap, he grabbed Xerxes’s claw and pulled him close enough to swing his axe at the Hippogriff.

Seeing the wound his mount had taken, Krasire jumped to the ground and engaged the Hobgoblin Vet hand to hand.

Much more to the Hobgoblin’s liking.

Soon the Shardmind was bloodied as well, desperately trying to heal himself while he wore down the veteran. Then the Hobgoblin got in a lucky blow and Krasire went down.

When he regained consciousness, Xerxes was licking his face and the Hobgoblin was dead nearby. He could see Quelenna’s mercenaries removing its head and mounting it on a pike. Apparently they had arrived in time to finish off the Hobgoblin and revive him.

By the time he got back to Sayre, Quelenna’s partisans were already celebrating her “victory” over the blockade.

...Failed to Decide They Need a Leader...

…Civiron, a sister city to Sayre, was burned to the ground…

…5,000 were killed, and the Coalition elected Lord Torrance as its leader. Torrance sent an emissary to Overlook, telling Kalad that the Coalition was willing to admit they were wrong about selecting a leader. This proved to be enough to convince the proud dwarven paladin to bring Overlook back into the coalition.

Krasire stopped to try to find the bodies of Klaxi and Lyrindel before he fled the collapsing iceberg. Without the enhanced magic of the Seed of Winter, its structural integrity was not going to last long.

Relvain Dragonpinner showed no such compunctions. The shieldmaiden headed out the secret door as soon as the first cracks began to show in the ice overhead.

Noticing objects embedded in one of the icy walls, the Shardmind threw everything he had into breaking them free. Sure enough, it was Klaxi and Lyrindel as they had been captured in ice by the gargoyles.

The prospect of carrying two bodies out of the magickal ice structure that was already breaking apart around him was too much for Krasire to try on his own, so he headed off to the dragon’s treasure room. He was able to leap up the slippery blocks of crumbling ice to get to the secret door to the Grand Hall where the Ice Gargoyles had killed Klaxi and Lyrindel, but he got the idea that acrobatics — as good as he was at them — might not be the best way to handle the slippery surfaces.

A hard run through the hall convinced him that was little better as a strategy for dealing with the dangerous surfaces.

In the Frost Giant Enclave, he found the rest of the party had left with Relvain, abandoning Uarion. The Githzerai mindmage insisted he was no longer under the control of the Seed of Winter and asked Krasire if he brought it with him. When the Shardmind admitted he had forgotten the Artifact, they returned to Chillreaver’s Chamber.

That return was made easier by the fact that Uarion had spent so much time as Chillreaver’s slave. He knew exactly how to open the door straight into the chamber. He simply dropped to his knees and bowed his head to the ice.

“Prepare for supplication in the proper manner,” Krasire said, remembering the words written on the ice. Those words, along with the door they were written upon, slid into the wall and they could see the Seed of Winter lying on the floor below.

As the Seed implored them to return it to the Winter Court, Uarion told Krasire to stand on the other side of the gallery. He blasted a Concussion Orb directly under the Seed, throwing it up into the hands of Krasire.

Snatching the acorn-shaped artifact from the air, Krasire spotted the best way back to the enclave where he saw the body of a Winter Wolf he had checked out earlier. It was still dead.

By now, the Shardmind was convinced getting out was going to prove harder than he thought at first. So he began using his arcane knowledge to find the best way out. After all, the iceberg was little more than a crystal held together with magic. Who better than a Shardmind to figure out how it would come apart?

This insight told him athletics might be the best way to climb down, followed by a leap or two to make his way the room where Uarion had imprisoned his ice-magma hybrids. He found the best way down a hole where Klaxi had left a rope pinned with the stolen trident.

When he got to Xurgelmek’s Chamber, his crystal prowess showed him the spot where a strategic stomp created a rough stair down to the lower level. Calling on all his endurance he was able to make it to the stairs before they collapsed.

The combination of his perception and his arcane knowledge was all it took to get him and Uarion to the last of the strange vessels — the Apparatuses of Kwalish — which looked like mechanical lobsters.

“They brought me here,” he told Uarion. “They should get us back to Nefelus.”

On his way to join the Coalition Council in Sayre, Kalad was assassinated by a crack team of Githyanki killers.

The actor who played Titus Androwdicus in Jerath’s play told Avenglen the bard was currently working on a much better play, called Roland and Juliette, which was currently on the road in a place called Sayre. He suggested it was a much more cultured city than Overlook and a better place to see good theater.

As she headed out of Elsir Vale toward this university town, Avenglen recognized the signs of war all around her. She had seen enough wars in her 146 years to spot the clues: refugees on the road, soldiers looking very serious on patrol.

As she neared Sayre, she saw a large group of soldiers heading out on what looked like an important mission.

Inside the city, she found accommodations at the River Jewel which turned out to be quite a nice inn. The clerk told he how to find the theater where she could see Roland and Juliette. He even mentioned Jerath was staying at the River Jewel himself.

Lord Torrance of Sayre ordered an immediate response to the outrage — the heroic dwarf paladin assassinated by Githyanki. But the Githyanki had already escaped via a portal to the Winter Court area of the Feywild. Anticipating the response, they had laid an ambush — manned by Hobgobilins — which caught Lord Torrance off guard and killed him.

Krasire brought the vessel back to Nefelus and was greeted by a very happy member of the Thraxinium, named Bejam. Amyria was there as well and they led him to a big parade were the people of the city feted him as the hero who had saved their city. The mages who had protected the island while Krasire was defeating the dragon were also hailed as heroes.

Amyria reminded him that the purpose of all this was to get Nefelus to join the alliance and send a representative to serve on the council. She suggested the end of the island’s isolation was over and the only problem might be Bejam’s willingness to serve on the council.

Krasire talked it over with Bejam and found that mage was struggling with this decision and wanted to do what was best for his people. But the Shardmind was able to convince him that representing those people on the council might be the best way to serve them.

Impressed with the arcane power of the mages of Thraxinium, Krasire pointed out those powers could best be applied to the protection of Nefelus through the alliance if he was representing them on the council. All it took was a bit more diplomacy and Bejam agreed to leave with Amyria as soon as he told the Thraxinium of his decision.

Once on the Conqueror, Krasire discovered the vessel was capable of flying. Although it had been anchored in the harbor at Nefelus, once Tokk’it and his ghostly crew got it under way, it was airborne in a short time, flying towards Sayre. Belinda went on ahead to get back to her studies at the university.

But it wasn’t long before she was back with bad news: Although the Coalition’s decision to name a leader — Lord Torrance, as it turned out — convinced Kalad to rejoin the council, he was assassinated on his way to rejoin them in Sayre. Lord Torrance was riding out to capture the Githyanki assassins who had pulled off this foul deed.

...Is Born

The Shieldmaiden Puts Her Shield…

…to a use no dwarven shield has ever been put before: pinning an exarch of Tiamat to the wall.

“The mages must be desperate to save their people. They send outsiders here to do their work. How weak! How pathetic! Soon the storm comes to them, and nothing will escape my wrath!”
— Chillreaver, Exarch of Tiamat

As she stepped into the chamber Chillreaver had constructed to house the Seed of Winter, Relvain Blackaxe was impressed by the terrifying sight.

The room was bathed in blue-white light, with beams focused on a small white object floating atop a pedestal high above her head. The beams seemed to originate from 10 silvery mirrors positioned along the east and west sides of the walkway 30 feet above the secret door they entered through.

Down on the level where she and the Shardmind stood, she could see the base of the pedestal where the beams were focused; the pedestal’s length made it appear almost like an ice obelisk. An energy hung about the room, and the air was colder than they’d felt anywhere else in the complex.

Briefly, she felt an invasive presence in her mind, as if it is searching for something . . . and then it was gone.

She saw that sat upon a rune-inscribed icy dais just in front of the secret entrance to the Treasure Chamber. A gigantic, two-headed white dragon met her gaze, its eyes black as the soulless depths and its mouths smoking with its icy breath.

A dire warning, then it attacked.

Her counter-attack was able to concentrate the dragon’s attention on herself. She and Krasire were able to create an opening so the Shardmind got around to the other side. Rather attacking from both sides, however, they decided the Psion should go about smashing the mirrors which seemed to be powering the small white object — the Seed of Winter, they assumed.

Krasire had some initial success, but he soon disappeared around the corner and Relvain heard no more mirrors breaking. She began to fear for their mission, even though the dragon was having a lot of difficulty hitting her. Trying to escape and bring back some help for Krasire, Relvain backed away from the two-headed dragon.

But the dragon was having none of that. Leaping into the air, it flew into the Treasure Chamber and blocked the only way out. That put its back against the wall and gave Relvain her chance. Her shield-trainers called it The Shield and a Hard Place. Placing her shield against the body of the dragon, she pressed it against the wall of ice, pinning it there.

And Relvain Dragonpinner was born. For the rest of her life, Relvain Blackaxe would remember the helplessness in the Exarch’s four eyes as she held it there.

“A small victory, perhaps,” thought the shieldmaiden, yet it gave her the hope she needed to continue once the dragon broke free.

Eventually, though her strength began to fade and she knew the battle was in the hands of Krasire. Unless he could break the rest of the mirrors, the dragon was sure to outlast her.

Avenglen regarded the enraged dwarf with curiosity. She found him outside the Orb Theatre, owned by a famous Drow Bard named Jerath. The dwarf was passing out handbills, which accused Jerath of plagiarizing some of his work. But it seemed to somewhat short of evidence of actual plagiarism. She went inside and saw the play — a bloody work called Titus Androwdicus — and talked to the main actor after the show. He had other explanations for Murrik Ironfell’s anger.

He knew it was a desperation measure, but Krasire was convinced he had to try something. Mental communication with the Seed of Winter was risky, yet it was something only a Psion like himself could try.

His desperation was well-informed: While the dwarven shieldmaiden was able to battle the two-headed dragon to a standstill — each of them able to damage the other only slowly — he could see she was weakening. The Exarch of Tiamat was simply able to take more damage than the plucky dwarf.

The Seed of Winter and Krasire, on the other hand, had reached a different kind of stalemate. His Irruption of the Living Gate had been able to break two of the mirrors which were powering the Artifact as soon as he had entered the room.

He had hoped to use the Gate to teleport to the upper level of the icy room where the mirrors were. The icy walls were too slick for his to climb. The Seed had stymied this plan with some kind of mental attack. Since that time, the Seed had dominated his mind, forcing him two the far end of the room where eight more mirrors poured energies from all over the world into the Seed itself.

“Why do you serve this dragon?” he asked the Seed. “Why not break free and work with us instead?”

He was not sure such a message would even get through. But answer came nonetheless. He was able to understand the mind of the Seed of Winter to such a degree that only a Psion could achieve. The Seed had four goals which informed its actions.

Bring the touch of winter to even the most sweltering climes.

Oppose the agents of the Summer Fey and elemental fire.

Demand obedience from the weak and frail.

Be reunited with the Winter Court in the Feywilde.

“We could help you,” he told the Seed. “We could take you to the Winter Court.”

The Concordance the Artifact had reached with the Exarch was too strong. He could tell the offer was tempting the Seed, but Chillreaver was allowing the Seed to bring cold and ice to this tropical Paradise and it was demanding obedience from the Council of Mages who ruled the place.

Their agreement on these two principles had allowed the dragon and the Seed to reach a level of Concordance that practically welded their minds into one. Krasire could see the Exarch was using the Seed of Winter for its own purposes. He also saw it would never see that itself as long as the mirrors were giving it such power.

He had to break the mirrors. First, however, he had to break free of the Seed’s mental grasp.

Then, he got his chance: When the Artifact’s attacks failed, he teleported to the upper level and ran to hide from the Seed’s line of sight in an alcove where the main door was still closed. From there, he was able to finish off the mirrors on the side where his Living Gate had irrupted earlier.

“Fortunately, I was able to preserve my mental powers while I was dominated.”

But some of the mirrors on the other side were out of the reach of his mental blasts. So he ran for a different kind of protection: Each mirror was in its own tiny alcove; by keeping his body pressed against the wall of the nearer alcoves, he was able to stay out of the line of sight of the acorn-shaped Artifact.

He broke the first two mirrors by dashing from alcove to alcove. The third alcove presented a different problem. Situated directly in front of the Seed of Winter, its walls provided him no protection from its line of sight. He knew he could not allow it to resume its domination of his mind.

So he ran behind the mirror and hid from it there. When the Seed shifted its focus to Relvain, he was able to smash the eighth mirror from behind and dash to hide behind the ninth mirror.

The dwarf fell once both the dragon and the Seed were using their powers on her. So, Krasire found himself trapped in the next-to last alcove by the dragon. His Kinetic Wave was perfect for this situation, though, and he used it to blast the mirror and the dragon simultaneously.

The mirror shattered, the dragon was pushed back 20 feet, and he dashed to hide behind the final mirror.

The dwarf had recovered enough to try to distract the dragon from below and another Kinetic Wave shattered the final mirror. As it fell in pieces to the floor 30 feet below, the Seed of Winter fell from its pedestal as well.

The dragon looked around in alarm as a blast of energy crackled through the room. It flew out of the room into its treasure chamber and out a hole in the top of that room — which they had noticed earlier.

Seconds later it became apparent what the dragon was fleeing. A great rumbling sound was followed by deafening cracks. The magic which sustained Icehome was becoming undone, and the whole structure would soon crumble into the sea.

...And Take Down the Ice Gargoyles...

…With a Few Comments About the Bravery…

…of the Adventurers Waiting in the Wings.

“Pass through this portal and enter the presence of Chillreaver, master of Icehome, greatest among the Dark Queen’s frozen children. Prepare for supplication in the proper manner, and you can enter his fearsome domain and receive his cold gift.” Using his arcane powers, Krasire was able to see through the illusion which was hiding these words.

But he didn’t have much time to figure out what they meant. With the sounds of cracking ice, two of the statues came to life.

At first he had a lot of confidence in his ability to damage them. When the grabbed him, he could still use his mental powers to chip away at them. The dwarven defender who came up here with him — after berating the wounded warriors below as cowards — was able to keep one of them occupied most of the time.

Even when he was grabbed, failed to escape, and imprisoned in an ice-cube jail, he could still hit the Ice Gargoyles and escape with a teleport.

Eventually his mental powers began to flag, and he ran out of teleports. Then his confidence began to flag as well.

Bloodied, he fought on. But he began to wonder if this would be his last fight. A claw attack took him down. And, as he slipped out of consciousness, his logical mind could not fail to notice that the life force that animated his crystals was fading, too.

Avenglen finally found civilization in the small human city of Fallcrest. The High Warden who ruled in his small court seemed unusually familiar with the arts in the area. Warden Markelhay even said he knew the famous Drow Bard himself. Apparently Jerath had spent a short amount of time in Fallcrest before moving on to bigger and better things in the Elsir Vale — to the west. His wife explained that the Bard had built a theater — called The Orb Theater — in the Dwarven city of Overlook. She even suggested her daughter was reporting that his fame had spread to Sayre, a university city closer to the coast.

Relvain Blackaxe gave the fallen Psion a potion of regeneration. Made from Troll blood, the potion would keep the Shardmind on his feet.

Sure enough, Krasire was able to resume his attacks. Relvain wasn’t certain he would ever resume his confidence. The brush with death had weakened his resolve and he called out an apology: “I’m sorry if my weakness caused your death.”

The shieldmaiden, however, was having none of that. “Oh, I’m not going to die. And, with that potion in your bloodstream, I don’t think you will, either.”

She saw the growing recognition in his eyes as he seemed to figure out how the potion could keep on healing him. His renewed determination and fancy footwork helped her take down one of the gargoyles.

Then it was easy for her to force the last statue’s attention to remain on her — she was a Dwarven Defender, after all — and Krasire was able to shift away and bring his mental powers to bear.

...and no one hears...

…does it make a sound?

Both Klaxi and Lyrindel died fighting some Ice Gargoyles, but no one will ever know how bravely they fought, how close they came to defeating the last gargoyle, or what they might have learned about them because no one saw they die and survived.

Those who did survive will just have to fight their fight all over again and learn it all themselves.

Ice-Boosted Giants Return...

…To Take Back Their Lair

Borg could not see newcomer from his perch on the giants’ icy platform, but he could hear her. “I think it’s Andrea Ravn,” the Hamadryad told him. She seemed reassured.

When Nara returned, he was glad they had help. Nara seemed energized. When they drove her up the slide, she was hardly injured. But now the icy blue glow in her eyes was stronger. Borg could only speculate about what was different.

“Maybe the Seed of Winter has some power beyond enslaving these creatures,” he thought to himself. “It could have given her special cold powers. Or something.”

It didn’t take long before he got a look at the newcomer: Nara slid both of them off the edge into the waters below, as another Winter Wolf attacked them and the Frost Giant peppered them with icy bolts.

The newcomer was a Dragonborn warlord. Not ideal as a defender, but better than Borg himself.

Or the druid: Lyrindel was constantly transforming back and forth between her beast form — a swarm of insects — and her dryad form. It made it hard to injured her permanently, but it didn’t do much to hold the wolf back.

Andrea Ravn suddenly realized this was no ordinary dream. She had heard of DreamQuests before, but she had never experienced one. The fortuneteller in the dream…something was fishy about her. “Thank you for coming, my friends,” the fortuneteller said to those gathered there. But Andrea was not sure she was a friend. She searched the dream house for clues about what was wrong…and failed. She awoke from the dream unrested. She found she was no longer in the Solace Bole. “Back in the iceberg, I see.” She saw some of her companions still sleeping, but Lyrindel was missing. She climbed up the tunnel the Umber Hulks had excavated. But before she found the dryad, she heard a giant attacking.

When they finally killed off the wolf, Lyrindel could see that Andrea was having trouble keeping all their spirits up. They managed to get back up the ice stairs, but Nara kept pushing them toward the edges.

“Keep to the center of the platform!” she shouted. And the new elf was doing a good job at that. But it was hard for Lyrindel and Andrea to flank the other giant sometimes without getting perilously close to the drop-off.

Sure enough: When Lyrindel shifted back to her humanoid form, Nara caught her on the slippery ice and sent her off the 30-foot drop. Not into the icy water this time, but she took more damage falling to the hard ice of the iceberg.

“Now I’m going to have to cross the stream again,” she thought. “Through that nasty fog.”

Yet the new elf — Borg, he said his name was — turned out to be a fast thinker. Before she could begin the roundabout path through the fog, he pointed at the ice at his feet. Green tendrils began to form. Through the ice, Lyrindel could see them growing rapidly inside the ice, finally reaching the ice below her, near her own feet. There they burst out, forming a portal in front of her.

“Step through!” he shouted from above.

When she did, she found herself back up on the platform. “That was easier than jumping the stream through that icy fog.”

Looking around, she saw that Andrea was about to pass out, even though they had finished off Nara’s ice-giant companion. Fortunately she and Borg were able to concentrate their damage on Nara and finish her off before the Dragonborn fell.

Lyrindel Dreams of Two Dragonborn...

,,,and Realizes she Knows one of them:

Andrea Ravn, the healer in their party.

Garen Bladerun pondered the meaning of his dream: How could someone else steal a part of his soul? “Sure, those who seek the Scale of War believe it is part of my soul.” But Andrea Ravn had no knowledge of his connection to Io. She thought he was dedicated to Bahamat. Not to the Platinum Dragon’s father.

Lyrindel remembered her dream. She was watching Andrea walk through a dark forest. She came to a clearing where a great spear rose from the earth itself. Andrea paused at the edge of the meadow to watch as a great bird flew toward the spear.

Lyrindel realized the bird did not see the spear. The blade of the Earth-Spear was so sharp, so thin, it could hardly be seen when viewed on-edge.

Andrea seemed to realize this. Her view of the spear was slightly aside from the path of the bird. She shouted warning the bird, but the great fowl did not heed her. It flew straight into the great head of the Earth-Spear and cleaved itself into two.

It took Andrea Ravn hours to get back to sleep. When she finally did she found herself in another dream: a quest dream, from which it seemed she could not escape without fulfilling some quest. Not as herself but as a human tasked with rescuing urchins from the grasp of an evil criminal who forced them to steal for him. His name was Gaedren Lamm.

Lyrindel looked on in amazement as the two pieces of the great bird fell, one on either side of the giant spear. For the two pieces did not die. Instead they sprang to the sky again, each a dragon. One of the dragons had metallic scales; the other did not.

Clinging to the head of the spear was a third portion of the great bird. It appeared to be an internal organ, sack-like in shape.

“Probably its stomach,” Lyrindel thought as the organ split open and spilled eight seeds onto the soft ground.

Seven of the seeds grew into dragons who flew off into the distance. The eighth seed sprouted last, into a dragonborn who was fully clad in full plate armor, shining in the sun in the manner of a paladin.

The armored dragonborn walked over to Andrea, who seemed to recognize him. Together they walked back into the wood.

Well, the Local Leader, at Least

Borg and Lyrindel Take on Nara

Lyrindel woke the rest of the Order of the Black Feather — or whatever they were calling themselves — inside the Solace Bole before the ritual’s effect dumped them back on the icy floor the crevasse room. They were still so groggy that most of them went right back to sleep.

Andrea, the warlord, didn’t even really wake up. She seemed to be caught in the depths of some dream. As soon as they were out of the Solace Bole, she lay down on the floor and fell back asleep.

But Lyrindel could see footprints in the snow which told a story: Someone had entered the room while they were hidden away in the Feywilde; the interloper had come in the way they had and immediately turned toward the tunnel excavated by the Ice-Touched Umber Hulks.

Inspecting the footprints, the druid became convinced they were made by an elf.

Re-assured, she entered the excavation and ran into an elven ranger returning to the crevasse room. The elf asked her who she was and explained that he had been sent by the High Lady to warn her about the dangers of the Seed of Winter.

“She told me it was dangerous for a member of the Summer Court to become attuned to it,” the ranger said. “We may need to find a Winter Court fey we can trust so we can hand it off to them. We might be able to carry it for a while, even use it. But we cannot risk extreme attunement.”

She introduced herself and found out the ranger was named Borg. He came from the Moonshae Islands. He told her that he had scouted the next room without being seen. It didn’t look like the giants there were watching the hole that was dug by the Umber Hulks, but they might be spotted if they enter by the main entrance.

The description of the room — which spiraled up to an ice bridge exiting to the next level — gave Lyrindel an idea: If they could sneak past the giants, she might be able to bring down the bridge with Earth Roots.

That might trap the giants on this level. Unfortunately, it would trap her sleeping companions down here with them.

So, they just went with a frontal assault. Borg went with a favorite ranger stance, the Skirmishing Stance. This stance was hampered somewhat by the fact that the giants’ ice arrows and frost attacks could slow or immobilize. Fortunately, they seldom were able to hit him.

Which was good, with their healer asleep and dreaming warlord dreams.

Once they got closer to the stream which flowed through the room, they realized the mist rising from it was dangerous in its own right. And the wolf on the other side was breathing frosty blasts of its own.

But they killed it quickly once they got under the bridge.

Andrea Ravn woke from a strange dream about a dragon and an elemental. She was still in the Solace Bole. The rest of her team was still sleeping around her. But thoughts about the dream kept running around in her head. The elemental clove the dragon in two. That was straight out of her religious training. All dragonborn are taught about the battle between Io and Erek-Hus at an early age. And two dragon-gods arising from the two halves of Io was well-known. But the part about the scales…she had no recollection of that. These thoughts seemed important somehow. And she kept going over and over them in her head. “I must get back to sleep,” she said. But it took her hours before she could actually rest.

Borg finished off the wolf before he tried to cross the river. But the crossing river was hard. As he got close, the mist around rising from the stream began to condense around his legs, slowing his progress.

“That’s gonna make it hard to jump across,” the dryad warned.

So, he decided to swim. Even that was impeded the freezing fog, but he was swept downstream. Finally he emerged from the water to discover an enormous stairway leading up to the ice bridge. He danced across the ice.

Before he even got to the stairs the first giant fell up on the ice bridge.

Seeing her companion go down, other ice giant — apparently named Nara — hightailed it up the steep incline.

Garen Bladerun jerked awake. He found himself in an unaccustomed luxury. “The River Jewel,” he thought to himself, remembering the name of the inn he was staying at. “In Sayre. But that was a weird dream.” Another dragonborn was in the dream, a warlord. And it seemed like she was trying to steal something from him. “Like she was trying to steal a part of my soul.” But that didn’t make any sense. The three who had tried to steal his soul had nothing to do with some warlord.

Hearing the laughter of Lyrindel, Jonalith made his way cautiously up the slope leading out of the crevasse room where they fought the Blue Hulks — the last thing he needed was to slip back into the hole.

Another voice — an elven voice? — joined the hamadryad’s. They seemed to be celebrating their victory over a wolf and a Frost Giant. A very large wolf. “Winter Wolf it looks like to me,” Jonalith. “It almost enough to give credit to the fey stereotype. Frolicking while there’s treasure to be found.”

As Jonalith looked around, he saw piles of equipment. Most of the weapons were too large to swung by any but a giant.

“But that doesn’t mean they don’t have baubles hidden among their personal belongings.”

Sure enough. A quick search revealed a large sack of coins, covered with runes. “Have to ask someone who knew Alexander Winterforged. These look dwarven to me. I’d guess there’s about 10,000 here.”

And Jonalith’s guesses were notoriously accurate, especially where gold was concerned.

It took a little more searching, but he also found a platinum ring with Bahamut’s symbol and a ruby-encrusted letter opener.

Introducing himself to the new elf — who turned out to be a ranger, too — he suggested they go wake up the others. “From the looks of things, about 15 Frost Giants live here. Even with this one, we can’t have accounted for more than a third of their number.”

Proof that the Seed of Winter...

…Can Corrupt Creatures Already Corrupted…

Klaxi inched his way into the icy chamber. He could hear something moving around in the rugged crevasse which split the upward slope. To his right, a newly excavated tunnel angled upward.

The high end of the tunnel (to the north) appeared to have another exit, but it was obscured by a giant stalagmite of ice.

But the Umber Hulks who had excavated the hole in the wall and were hiding in the crevasse must have heard him, too. Because they exploded out of the gap and rushed toward him.

Blue Umber Hulks.

Ice-Touched.

Klaxi raced out of the crevasse room just ahead of the creatures. Which were obviously under the control of the Seed of Winter.

Making his way to the fancy inn, Borg discovered it was called The River Jewel. It didn’t take long to find the member of the Coalition the Githzerai had told him about. Belinda was young, even for a human. She told him her parents would not like her to spend too much time in Nefelus. “It is under siege, surrounded by a ring of ice which blocks all shipping,” she explained. But I can get you past the ice.

Lyrindel was frustrated. The Ice-Touched Umber Hulks — “Blue Hulks?” she asked herself — had an attack which could daze creatures over a wide area.

They first used it when Klaxi came running out of the room where they hid. Raxor Steelwall rushed in to block their attack and found himself dazed and sliding toward the crevasse.

That seemed to be their strategy: Daze and slide their opponents into their hidey hole, then do a double grabbing attack with both of their claws. Once they had their prey in both claws, all they could do was crush their prey.

And most of the time the members of the Golden Scales — or the Order of the Black Feather, or whatever they were calling themselves these days, now they had joined the Alliance — were able to squirm free.

But dazed they couldn’t do much but swing at the creatures. And it took a lot of swinging to put a dent in the hulks’ armor. They concentrated their damage when they could. And, once they had bloodied the first of their targets, a new set of tactical options opened up.

For the creature could no longer daze with its gaze attacks, although it could still use the blasts from its eyes to slow its opponents.

“I suppose we could bloody all three, before we try to finish this one off,” she thought to herself. Then she saw the bloodied creature lift Klaxi off all of his feet.

“No, I think we should kill this one first. I’m not sure we can afford to take this much damage. After all, we are down to one healer. Warlords are all very good for encouraging others to keep fighting, but they have their limits.”

At the library of Nefelus, Borg asked the librarians about the Seed of Winter. Unfortunately, that raised suspicions. He was soon surrounded by official-looking people who wanted to know if he was part of the forces besieging their island. Once they found he was not, they asked him to help the forces trying to break the siege. He then found himself making his way toward the iceberg (where he suspected the Seed of Winter could be found) in a strange submersible craft which looked like a lobster.

Andrea Ravn could see that Raxor was handing out most of the damage, even if he wasn’t living up to his last name. “Steelwall, indeed. I never spent so much effort healing a wall.”

Indeed, the warlord had to resort to her best group heals to keep everybody alive.

But when she was handing out the orders, the monk was her go-to guy. All she had to do was point out an opening and he would deliver a good hit followed up with a flurry of blows. And when he was surrounded he could distribute that Stone Fist Flurry to a second Hulk.

And he was surrounded a lot. Finally the last of the blue creature went down.

After arguing with some of the others about a ring they found in the nose of one of the blue hulks, Andrea was glad when the druid identified it as a Ring of Personal Gravity. While the warlord knew she could use it, she gave it to Klaxi. Now she was the only healer. She would not be jumping to the fore, where the ring would be most useful.

“I guess my tanking days are done,” she thought ruefully.

Everyone agreed when she pointed out they needed to use their Scroll of the Solace Bole. When she read the words on the scroll, they all found themselves transported to a narrow space inside a tree located somewhere within the Feywilde.

Before she fell asleep, Andrea heard the hamadryad mumble, “Feels almost like home.”

Against his Will

The Githzerai Mindmage struggled…

,,,with the Seed of Winter even as it forced him to fight against his rescuers.

Klaxi was sure some of the pillars of ice between him and the figure on the far side of the prison were more than just ice stalagmites. He could see motion inside them, and he was sure they contained some of the elementals he had seen when he scouted this room earlier.

“But why would someone hide the elementals inside the ice?”

He approached the nearest pillar and began hacking at it to get to the elemental within. Some kind of fiery glow was visible inside. “Why would magma be associated with an ice elemental?” Klaxi was sure he had seen wind elementals as well, but that made no sense either.

“You have come to threaten the will of my master," a voice from the other end of the room accused. "The Seed must be protected at all costs. Approach no farther and leave the way you arrived, and I shall spare you the agony of the change.”

Klaxi thought he detected a glimmer of uncertainty in the way the creature he had been spoke, as if it were fighting against a force which was dominating its will.

Andrea Ravn rushed past to get to Uarion, the last survivor of Nefelus’s previous expedition to the strange, icy blockade of their tropical home. The Dragonborn Warlord was startled when the Githzerai unleashed a Chillfire Destroyer from the pillar Klaxi was attacking.

“An ice elemental powered by a core of super-heated magma. That explains the fiery glow.”

As Andrea tried to convince the Gith to be rescued, it continued to release elementals (Windwalkers as well as another Destroyer) cackling about how he was not so weak as to be vulnerable to Andrea’s intimidation.

As he continued to damage the first ice elemental, he realized its super-heated core was no longer being confined by the ice. In fact it was starting to burn him if he stood too close.

Once Amyria took him to the iceberg which seemed to be the source of the icy blockade, Raxor Steelwall made his way up through the caves below the ice to a chamber where a dead Behir was surrounded by a group of adventurers. They were plotting their next move, which seemed to revolve around rescuing a captured Githyanki.

Andrea Ravn could see her efforts to negotiate with Uarion were unsuccessful. So she concentrated on knocking the Githzerai unconscious before it could release more elementals.

Unfortunately, two of the ice elementals with red entrails were freed and a bunch of the Windwalkers before they were able to subdue the creature they were sent to rescue. Fearing mindmage shenanigans, he tried to tie the Gith up with rope after gagging him. Lyrindel, the dryad, was able to help (in between unleashing hordes of bugs on the elementals).

Borg followed the monk up the winding corridors inside the iceberg. He was cold. Maybe hitching a ride on the strange craft was not such a good idea.

Jonalith thought he saw the trick: The mindmage would have to be weakened before he could be convinced to shake off the will of the Seed of Winter.

But before he could tell the others, they had knocked out Uarion and were whittling down the Chillfire creatures. Each time one of those succumbed, it exploded in a ball of magma.

But by the time the second one died, they had learned to stand back as it exploded.

Searching the still-unconscious body, they found two potions of vitality and a large blue diamond. “Gotta be worth four or five grand,” the elf thought. But he still wasn’t sure a gag would do any good against a mage whose powers emanated from his mind.

Li Sun Manages to Save the Party...

…One last Time.

Li Sun knew he was on his last legs. Losing consciousness during the fight with Xurgelmek was the latest sign, but even during the battle at the entrance to Icehome he knew he was burning his inner resources at a furious rate.

As an ardent, he had been taught that a body can only heal so much.

And he knew that his had little left.

But the new fighter — a giant insect of some kind, who called himself “Klaxi” — was going to need some healing if he was to fight the behir. And everybody else seemed to be out it, except Valna.

Hardly a healer.

And, if they didn’t go fight the behir, the giant six-legged magickal lizard was going to come to them. It was already trying to widen the stairway down to where they resting.

When Klaxi charged the creature, Li Sun hoisted his weary bones off the icy floor and circled around to the other side. The behir was able to breathe lightning periodically so it wouldn’t help to stand back. “Might as well trap him between us,” Li Sun thought. “A little flanking never hurt.”

It turned out that getting up close and personal with the creature had its own problems. Not only did it have teeth and claws, but it was able to stomp so hard it could knock everyone around (for a considerable distance) to the ice. And then it devoured Klaxi.

“Well, that’s gonna make it hard to heal him.”

Li Sun could tell the fighter was trying to force his way back out. But even the ardent’s mental powers could not heal someone — or some insect — he could not see.

Fortunately, Li Sun had planted Treachery’s Seed in the behir’s weak little mind at the beginning of the battle. So every time it clawed him, it took a little bit out of itself.

The High Lady reguarded Lyrindel carefully. “You have served the Feywilde well. Mapping the Feydarke was a harrowing mission, but an important one. Now a new threat has arisen, one that cannot be charted. The Winter Court has taken an interest, and the Summer Court as well. The Moonshaes cannot afford to be ignorant of this new threat, an artifact known as The Seed of Winter. It may not even be safe for us to capture it, for it might corrupt us. We may even need it to be in the hands of the Unselie Court themselves.”

Klaxi had never been devoured before. But that did not mean he had to stop fighting.

On Athas, he often fought for his life. Not like this. He could still fight the creature from inside its maw, but getting out was his highest priority. Occasionally he got in an extra blow with one of his arms when the behir tried to attack the ardent.

But he still tried to pry his way out using his athletic skills.

Still having trouble getting free. “At least it cannot swallow anyone else while I’m stuck in its craw.”

When he finally forced his way out, he was close to dying. (“Or being digested,” he thought as the lightning breath flashed around him. “Who would have thought you could be digested by lightning?”)

Li Sun was able to heal him heroically before the behir turned on the healer.

And devoured him as easily as it had devoured Klaxi.

The Thri-Kreen warrior redoubled his attacks on the behir, which was still doing a lot of damage to itself. But Li Sun was having a much harder time escaping the creature’s jaws than Klaxi had. The ardent was trying a different approach — apparently impressed with how difficult his own brute-force methods had proved. He was trying to finesse his way out, twisting and turning as he trying make his way past the creature’s lashing tongue.

But Li Sun was no better as a acrobat than he was as an athlete. Klaxi could tell he had little chance of avoiding digestion. So he attacked the creature with everything he had.

It was not enough.

The behir was still unbloodied when the Thri-Kreen warrior admitted he had to retreat. “Maybe some of the others I saw in the entrance to the strange place will be able to help me pry the ardent clear,” he thought, even while he admitted to himself he was just rationalizing his failure.

He was able to convince one of the elven archers — the one who had come across with him in the mechanical lobster — to race back upstairs and help him rescue Li Sun.

He stood at the top of the stairs in shocked disbelief: Li Sun had somehow extricated himself from the behir. But the ardent lay unconscious at the creature’s feet. Klaxi could see he was still breathing, but he seemed to lack the inner resources to rouse himself.

Even as the behir devoured him again.

Lyrindel looked up at the librarian. The Great Temple of Nefelus was not a place where researchers were often disturbed. “Why have you been so interested in this Seed you seek? Our ritualists have need of the book you are reading.” When she explained that The Seed of Winter was an important artifact and might even be sentient, she was met with a cold stare. Then the ritual casters behind the matron explained that they believed that The Seed of Winter was part of an assault on their island nation. She told them they had to act fast. But the ritualists were dead set on maintaining their protections, not on journeying to the iceberg. So Lyrindel decided to help the brave adventurers they had sent to break the blockade.

That left him glad he had circled around while the Thri-Kreen charged up the most direct route. Valna found a room with a clear shot at the creature, along with plenty of ice pillars — stalagtites of a sort — behind which he could hide.

Once the blue lizard swallowed Li Sun, it became more lethargic and Valna was happy to reward its digestive torpor with a rain of arrows. Meanwhile, Klaxi was maintaining a steady attack on the creature himself.

All the while swearing to cut open the creature when it died.

They were able to bloody it quickly and then finish it off before it did too much damage to Klaxi. Indeed it hardly even injured Valna himself.

“That the advantage of being a ranger: range.”

When it was all over, they were able to cut Li Sun free of the behir stomach. But he was beyond all healing, partially digested and barely recognizable.

Valna pointed out the obvious to Klaxi. “The creature was only able to devour one of us at a time, with a stomach his size. It appears Li Sun has saved our lives one last time.”

The Thri-Kreen turned to him and said, “‘Even in death, the hero can save others.’ The words of my people always rung true to me. But I never dreamed they would apply to a healer.”

Nearby they found some bodies of the sailors who came with Uarion. The blue frog people were apparently feeding the remains to the behir.

Among the bones they found a set of finely made hide armor. Klaxi recognized the hide as coming from a beast from his home world. Kanks are large hive insects that can sometimes be trained and domesticated. When they cannot, they are hunted for their hides.

Their hides are not as highly valued as those of the Athasian roc or the nightmare beast. But on a world where metal is rare, any hide which can be enchanted is highly valued.

Also found among the bones:

a small wooden box containing an elixir of some kind;

2 pieces of amber carved to look like stars;

a strange pair of studded leather boots; and

some bracers which appear to be nothing more than white linen arm guards.

With the Reluctant Help of A Frost Eye

Klaxi made his way to the iceberg…

…so much water…

…cold water…

…so cold it became hard like a rock.

Klaxi had a hard time getting his Athasian mind around the concept. Some of it was almost soft, but some of it was so hard that the structure he had entered — the Nefelese called it an “iceberg” — seemed to have been carved from the hard kind.

Inside, he found a wounded dragonborn, an elven archer, and an ardent healer. The archer pointed up one stairway and said told Klaxi there was a multi-legged blue lizard there. “But the big frogman up this one is headed our way!” he shouted, turning to face the other stairs.

Klaxi rushed up the stairs in time to stop a large blue creature frog-like features from rushing the stairs.

“How dare you invade the barony of Xurgelmek!” shouted the frogman. Pretty soon Klaxi was being peppered by icy blasts from a nearby Beholder while the ardent used one of the tridents (apparently seized from a dead frogman) and provided what healing he could.

The ardent did not seem to notice, but it was readily apparent that the Frost-Eye Beholder’s heart was not really in this fight.

“Maybe I can intimidate him once the baron is dead,” Klaxi thought. “We should be able to demonstrate our ability to hurt him, then he may just take off.”

Andrea Ravn shivered on the small ice floe. She was exhausted. She could hear the battle going on up the stairs. It sounded like they needed her healing. But it was all she could do to heal herself. “At least I told them about the Beholder.”

Li Sun was frustrated with the way the Beholder kept vanishing up a hole in the ceiling each time he took a potshot at them, so he concentrated his attacks on Baron Xurgelmek.

And, with Jonalith taking his own sweet time coming up to help them, Li Sun concentrated his healing on the Thri-Keen who was leading the fight. Li Sun had to be impressed with the way the insect creature was able to get in an extra hit every time they had the baron surrounded and it tried to slip away.

Then two more Arctic Suahagin popped out of a hole filled with sea-water, and Li Sun was glad to see Jonalith show up with his bow.

Amyria asked Belinda to take her back to Sayre. “I think it’s time to shore up our Alliance.”

Jonalith concentrated on taking out the two smaller froggies first, then they were able to surround the big one, who kept calling himself Xurgelmek and demanding they surrender.

Once they took out the smaller creatures, Xurgelmek was easily surrounded. Especially with the fancy footwork of the insect warrior who had joined them. The big frog was harder to take down. But, once they did that they were finally able to prevent the Beholder from dodging up a shaft.

Jonalith finally bloodied the icy Beholder, but he was on his last legs. The Thri-Keen warrior was in no better shape, but he began to threaten and intimidate the Frost-Eye. “These froggies sure had plenty of loyalty to their baron, and look what it got them,” he shouted.

At first the intimidation seemed to have little effect, but Klaxi persisted. Eventually the Beholder gave up, babbling something about the broken promises of dragons. Some sharp questioning gave them a basic idea of the layout above. He also told them the captured githzerai was in the room at the top of the shaft in the ceiling.

“The dragon is doing something with the Seed of Winter up near the top.”

Jonalith asked him if he could be trusted if they let him go.

“Yeah, sure. Frost-Eyes can be trusted. I ain’t coming back to this place. They promised me slaves, and I got none. Instead they almost got me killed. You notice that baron guy trying to protect me? Neither did I.”

With that the Beholder dove into the water and disappeared.

A search of Baron Xurgelmek’s body revealed some unusual magical leather bands on his feet, apparently designed to aid in fighting while prone. Since Klaxi spent so much of the fight on the floor, Jonalith immediately thought of the Thri-Keen fighter.

Arctic Creatures Greet the Newest Members...

…of the Order of the Black Feather…

…with the traditional customs of their people: brandishing their tridents and gnashing their teeth.

Li Sun was frustrated at how hard it was to get at the Arctic Sahuagin swarming his vessel. So he was hardly surprised when Jonalith climbed the mechanical lobster up on the shelf of ice and raced it toward the only exit from entrance cavern.

The stairs beyond seemed to lead up into the iceberg above them and the elf seemed to be trying to prevent the blue frogmen from escaping upward. “Maybe he’s worried about their allies further up.”

As soon as Jonalith had wedged the vehicle into the stairwell, he climbed out and began peppering the Sahuagin with arrows. The creatures immediately abandoned their attempts attack the vessels with tridents thrown from a distance and swarmed the elf on top of the submersible.

“Never seen a ranger tank before.” But Li Sun had to admit that Jonalith was doing a pretty good job of drawing their fire. He saw Andrea jump out and start healing, but the elf needed the healing of an ardent as well.

“Oh, well,” he said, climbing out into the fray, “I guess I’ll have to expose myself as well.”

Tokk’it directed the insectoid creature (which Belinda insisted was her latest recruit) up to the temple which also served as the seat of government in this besieged paradise.

Andrea Ravn was so worried about the damage the Sahuagin priest was handing out that she began to draw deeper on her special reserves. She hardly noticed the disapproval of the others, who were obviously saving their resources for subsequent battles.

Every time they got position on one of the frogmen, the priest would use some power to blast them out of position. The snow was not all that slippery, but the creature seemed to be able to make seem like pure ice.

Toward the end of the fight, Andrea even downed one of her regeneration potions. When Li Sun tried to stop her, she downed it anyway. A few moments later, the potion became invaluable as Andrea herself was knocked unconscious a brought right back by the regeneration.

Even Li Sun had to admit the fight was close enough after the priest exploded in ice shards that the potion may have been necessary.

Klaxi made his way up the steep hillside and met a strange lady at the library. Tokk’it had described it as a temple, but it seemed more dedicated to books and learning to Klaxi. “Maybe they worship knowledge in this culture,” he said, but no one really paid attention. They all seemed to be going about their own business.

Jonalith was glad the blue Sahuagin concentrated on the two healers after they demonstrated their prowess at the beginning of the battle. But he had to use all of his multi-shot tricks with his bow to finish them off at the end.

Li Sun even broke his magic longspear before the battle was over. “That might even be more of a problem than all of the dailies Andrea spent,” he told the ardent.

They found nothing on the bodies except some tridents to replace Li Sun’s broken weapon.

Andrea spotted an underwater tunnel leading upward. Since it was too small for the submersibles, the Dragonborn warlord decided to swim it herself. She returned quickly admitting that she had aroused the attention of “the largest froggie I’ve ever seen.”

She did get a pretty detailed look at the room, describing a Frost-Eye Beholder guarding a tunnel exiting the ceiling.

Jonalith decided he better do the scouting.

Picking the left-most stairs — “furthest from where Andrea found the Arctic Sahuagin,” he reasoned — he crept up and around the corner. But the Frost-Touched Behir spotted him quickly and he retreated.

“Only one way left to try,” he said as he mounted the other stair. Jonalith could not see the Frost-Eye or the shaft that Andrea mentioned, but it was hard to miss the giant Arctic Sahuagin turning his way.

The Iceberg Known as Icehome...

…Using Vehicles which Look Like…

…giant mechanical lobsters, the three adventurers had to split up: Li Sun and Jonalith took the first submersible, while Andrea Ravn had to go it alone in the second.

Andrea Ravn remembered most of what her teachers had said about Nefelus. “Sure, the city of Magic has been out of contact with the rest of the world for over 400 years,” her master told her. “But that is hardly ancient history. Two millenia have passed since the world heard from the Dragonborn Empire.”

Nefelus was an island nation when it came to prominence defeating a great evil that threatened the whole world. But they came to believe the rest of the world was insufficiently grateful for their efforts.

“They had nothing to do with the causes of the problem, at least in their minds,” her master told her. “But they were crucial to the solution and they thought everyone should be mindful of their contribution.”

Andrea understood the lack of appreciation might have been only in the minds of the Nefelese, but that was enough for them to withdraw from the rest of civilization and become isolationist. “As if hiding from the world would mean the problems of the world would never find you,” she thought.

As soon as the city came into view, Andrea saw the Temple. Famous the world over Andrea was clear that the building housed one of the greatest libraries in the world. While she hungered to break off from the party and explore its shelves, she found herself ushered along with the rest of her group.

Andrea was happy to find that their guides (who acted as much like guards as ushers) took them to the Temple itself. Amyria told them to wait while she met with the Thraxinium (some sort of council of mages which ruled over this magocracy).

Eventually they were able to question their host — a member of this august body — who told them about the magickal assault Nefelus found itself under.

“Just before Nefelus was blockaded by the ice we sent three ships to find the source of the problem,” he told them. “Two were lost, but one made it to the iceberg. The crew perished, save one. Uarion was a Githzerai whose mental powers enabled him to make it inside, but we do not know what became of him once he got too close to the Seed of Winter.”

Before she knew what she was saying, Andrea — along with Jonalith and Li Sun — had promised to rescue Uarion, capture the Seed of Winter, break the blockade, and free Nefelus from the icy ring which surrounded it.

“At least, we can bring back his body,” she thought to herself.

After Amyria told them this promise the thing to bring Nefelus into the coalition, Bejam took them to three vessels capable of traveling underwater.

“Perhaps, if you approach unseen, you will not be attacked like the other three vessels,” he told them.

Andrea was so confident in her ability to figure out the submersibles that she decided to pilot one by herself. She recognized the vessels as Apparatuses of Kwalish. Confident that she knew enough of the history of Kwalish (a renowned inventor and magician) that she could figure out the controls.

Once she was in the craft, she found she did not remember as much as she thought she did. Before she was able to use what she remembered about how Kwalish like to design his inventions, she was floundering around in the shallows.

“I hope that doesn’t attract the attention of the Arctic Sahaugin Bejam told us about. I don’t like frogmen, even if these are blue.”

Klaxi found the City of Argent in the midst of a siege. An older gentleman, who seemed to be in charge of its magickal defenses, asked him to go to Nefelus to recruit additional mages. “I think Amyria has a plan to enlist their aid,” he said. “Belinda of Fallcrest should be able to help you find her.” Then he gave the insect-warrior a scroll which would take him to Belinda’s mother. “Perhaps you should avoid mentioning all this to her father.”

Jonalith was not sure what was going on in the other submersible, but it didn’t look good.

“Perhaps I can lead her to a safer path,” he told Li Sun, who was in the same craft. “An elf should be able to find the way, even underwater.”

Watching the currents it did not take him long to guide the mechanical lobster into a narrow trench pointed straight towards the iceberg.

“Not only will this protect us from observation, but look at those currents.”

Once Li Sun had them point out, he was amazed. “Those’ll cut 30 minutes off the time the trip takes us.” Jonalith knew Li was thinking about the limited air in their vessel. Then she saw Andrea avoiding some of the Sahuagin as she scurried her vessel into the trench behind them.

He saw Li Sun was using his arcane knowledge to figure out how to operate the claws of the lobster. “just stick your hands in here and wiggle your fingers,” the ardent said as the claws lifted up off the muddy bottom. “I should be able to even help you move along. And, if we have to fight some blue froggies….”

The claws snapped enthusiastically.

Tokk’it was hardly surprised when another adventurer came through the portal with Belinda. But the nature of the creature… “He seems to be some kind of insect,” he whispered to the young wizardess, who nodded with a smile.

Through the sealed porthole, Li Sun could see that Andrea was finally getting the hang of the controls. “Maybe all that history helped her figure out some of the quirks of these machines. Kwalish sure had some funny ideas about how to make them do what you want them to do.”

Just then Jonalith dropped the submersible all the way into the lowest point in the trench. “More frog-boys,” he whispered, and Li Sun frantically gesture back to Andrea. The warlord seemed to get the message and slowed her vessel as well.

As Andrea sat motionless, apparently waiting for the Sahuagin to pass, she seemed to be practicing with the claws which Li Sun had already mastered. “Finally trying out her Arcana skills,” he told Jonalith.

Sure enough, when they started up again, he could see the dragonborn was using the claws as well as the legs to propel the craft forward. A little fiddling with his own arcane skills and Li Sun was helping push his submersible along as well.

As they approached the iceberg, Li Sun could see the frozen formation had reached all the way to the bottom. “That could make it hard to climb up,” he said to the elf.

But Jonalith was already on it. He found a narrow tunnel leading upward into the iceberg. As the ranger steered the vessel inside, Li Sun turned around to see that Andrea’s lobster was still following.

Surrounding the Island-City-State...

…known as Nefalus.

Tokk’it guided the Conqueror toward the spot where Amyria’s maps suggested the island city-state of Nefelus was located. But all he could see was a fog bank up ahead.

And the allies Amyria had promised him for this adventure had so far been slow to arrive. Li Sun and Andrea Ravn had showed up — through the portal Belinda left on the foredeck — but he was expecting more help for such an important mission. But a warlord and an ardent might be just the ticket if they needed a lot of healing in their attempt to run the blockade.

Still, a blockade made of fog was not what Tokk’it had expected.

“Strange way to set up a blockade. Seems like ships could just sail right through it. Still, the fog may be hiding the real obstacle.” But what navy — trying to blockade an island — would hide themselves in such an unnatural fog? “Surely that would help the blockade-runners more than the blockade.”

He adjusted the horizontal tiller a bit to bring his airship up to a high altitude as it entered the fog bank.

Amyria knew she faced a difficult task getting everyone in the Alliance to accept a single leader. “And it will only be harder once the Nefelese are involved. Lord Torrance will surely be jealous of the superior magickal resources of Nefelus.” She remained certain the Alliance needed everything it could muster.

Li Sun stood on the foredeck, squinting into the mist. Now that the Conqueror had entered the fog, he could barely see the end of the bowsprit jutting out in front of the airship.

The ardent only spotted the iceberg after a ghost-sailor in the crow’s nest shouted out and Tokk’it threw the ship hard to starboard to avoid it.

“What is an iceberg doing to high?” Li Sun was sure they entered the fog at least 100 feet above the water and the captain was obviously trying to get even higher. But as the ship narrowly avoided the ’berg, he could see just how big it was.

And Tokk’it was angling the vessel upward so rapidly that Li Sun had to grab the railing. Even so, the airship barely reached the lip of a growing wall of ice.

“That’s what they are trying to block the island with! A giant wall — or even a hemishere — of ice.”

But the barracade still had a hole in it. And Tokk’it was trying to smash it larger by driving the airship through the hole.

And whoever was erecting the ice-wall was not taking chances: Ice giants were positioned at the hole. They were already directing volleys of Icy Arrows at the heroes on the decks of the ships. Andrea, the dragonborn, was valiantly trying to operate the ballista on the main deck.

When her first bolt was easily dodges by one of the giants who did not have a frostbow, the warlord gave that up as a bad job.

Amyria did not hesitate. She ran out on the bowsprit as it punched into the ice and leapt to the flat ice at the bottom of the hole, taking the fight right to the giants. When Andrea followed her out onto the ice, Li Sun decided she would have to get out there and help them.

The airship slowed significantly as the bow plowed into the ice-wall, but Li Sun could see that the ice was breaking. Perhaps they could smash through.

Once he got out on the ice, he caught up with the others. Then it was time to fight a rear-guard action as the giant from the other side of the ship circled around in front of the vessel and tried to trap Andrea in an icy vice.

Amyria was able to fight valiantly against the giants, but nothing she did could stop them from attacking the two healers.

Then, as the first of the Ice Giants fell to Amyria’s onslaught, Li Sun saw the airship break through to the other side of ice wall.

All they had to do was fight their way back aboard…

…before the vessel slid through the hole.

Klaxi was not sure why he had been summoned to the queen’s chamber, but he was sure it was a great honor. “If I was in trouble, she would certainly send out her drones to punish me.” But he was not prepared for her request that he represent the hive in some faraway city called Argent. “On another plane, no less.”

As the Conqueror worked its way through the hole in the iceberg-wall surrounding Nefelus, Andrea Ravn saw Li Sun step easily aboard. The ship continued to slide forward and Amyria was able to leap the remaining distance to the vessel.

Knowing she had stubby dragon wings to help her leaping ability, Andrea stayed behind to delay the Ice Giants and prevent them from getting aboard the ship. But she was overwhelmed when the giants concentrated their efforts on her.

Apparently stopping anyone from breaking through their blockade was important to them.

Even if the “anyone” was just a dragonborn warlord from the swamps of a dead empire.

Slowed by the icy cold from the giants, Andrea had little chance to make the leap

So, when Li Sun threw her the rope he had tied to the mast earlier, she leapt into the fog and ended up swinging from the stern of the airship. Li Sun came over to help her climb up the rope, but a swing and a leap — aided by her stubby little wings — was all it took.

“No climbing required,” she exulted as she landed on the afterdeck, admitting she did not relish being dragged along the ice until Li Sun had pulled her above the keel.

We are ending the tax-season hiatus this Saturday (May 7).

And the Rogue Mage Locks them...

Ragnar the Mighty wasn’t about let a measly door stand in his way. Jon said it was magickally locked, but that didn’t stop Ragnar. He lowered his head and tried to smash it in.

And rebounded from the door without even touching it.

So, he tried again.

And bounced off without damaging the door. The elf suggested they both try at once. And, sure enough, the door opened to their combined strengths.

Inside they found a crystal ball, a curtain, and a desk. Ragnar lifted the curtain and found a robed magician.

Paldemar!

He charged and Paldemar disappeared. Jonalith got a shot off, Paldemar used his invisibility to make his escape and lock the two of them in his room.

Deciding to take advantage of the situation to steal anything that wasn’t nailed down, Ragnar approached the crystal ball. But, as soon as he tried to pick it up, he saw a figure in shadowy robes within the crystal. It reached out its arm as if pointing toward him. A psychic blast hit him in the forehead, and the crystal ball shattered into hundreds of shards.

“I guess those pieces won’t be worth much,” he told Jon.

Paldemar took advantage of this situation by taking pot shots at from one door and then the other. So they wrestled the bed they found behind the curtain to block one door and positioned themselves near the larger door. Ragnar got off a surprise attack when the Mage opened the door and Jonalith managed to slip inside before the Norker Slinger who was helping Paldemar could shut the door.

Even though his blow had driven Paldemar to the ground, the wizard managed to get inside and restore his Mage Lock on the door.

“Magic,” the barbarian cursed and proceeded to take his anger out on the slinger. Unable to use his sling, the Norker was reduced to ankle-biting and daggers. Ragnar and Jonalith finished him off pretty quickly. But not before another Norker showed up. Ragnar recognized this one as a berserker.

By the twin flails he was wielding.

Just then, Jerath showed up.

“Well, that was strange,” the hobbit said to his sister. “One of those Mages of Saruun came asking me about why we haven’t seen any of them around lately. How should I know?”

Jerath followed the instructions he got from Blackguards’ Bane after the assassin let him through the hidden door at a turn in the Road of Lanterns. The Spirit of Vecna demanded lore, power or his soul, but ended up satisfied with very little.

He made his way through two levels of the tower-like maze and found Li Sun and some others. The ardent was in pretty bad shape, but told Jerath to hurry through yet another portal. “Jon and Ragnar have gone ahead to find Paldemar, but I fear they’re going to need your healing.” Then Li Sun explained the layout of the next level.

Taking stock of the situation, Jerath decided to go straight to the big room to find Jonalith and Ragnar. And they sure were in need of healing. But as soon as he started that task, he found himself attacked by a wizard who had appeared behind him.

And then the statue of Vecna began blasting him as well.

Jonalith told him he couldn’t take any more healing, but that was just as well. Jerath backed away from the statue, but Ragnar insisted on charging repeatedly at a Norker who was sheltering near it. He needed all the healing Jerath could deliver.

There’s only so much that words of encouragement can do.

Once the Norker went down, Jerath hid behind one the crystal pillars whose magic Paldemar had depleted and sent the wizard blundering into the path of one of Ragnar’s charges. At first the barbarian didn’t understand what Jerath was doing, but once he saw Paldemar blunder toward him, he was glad to charge and attack.

“Paldemar not only sent us off on that wild goose chase,” one white-robed mage told the other, “he seems to have disappeared himself. The halfling just told me no one has seen the any of our Order for several days. After he promised he would keep up appearances in our absence.”

Jonalith saw his chance. The giant Bronze Warder could not make its way between the pillars and other obstacles to attack the bard, but it still had one chance to attack. It would have to target the barbarian instead of Jerath.

And there was only one path toward Ragnar.

So Jon put a trap right in the middle of that path. He could see that the giant construct noticed the trap, but it apparently thought it could push its way past, relying on its enormous bulk to absorb the trap’s damage.

“Not this trap,” he thought as the contraption stepped on the trap and slid backwards, its motion momentarily arrested. When it tried to move again, it found iself slowed dramatically.

When the Idol of Vecna sent a fiery blast his way, Jonalith realized that he could draw its fire by staying close to it and his resistance to that element would prevent all but the most extreme fire damage.

“Nobody get close to the Idol,” he shouted. “I’ll draw its fire. I can take it.”

That was all it took to finish off Paldemar. Then it was simply a matter of maneuvering to places the Warder could not reach and pot-shotting it with arrows.

...of his Fellows from the Order...

…Li Sun Decides to Scout the Lair of Paldemar…

…alone.

The dim light of the Shrine of Vecna seemed to come from the walls themselves. Li Sun could see three doors. Knowing that Paldemar was aware his infernal machine had been destroyed, he tested each door quietly.

The door to the west was locked.

The door to the east was unlocked. The ardent opened it quietly and saw another of the Bronze Warder. Fortunately, the Warder did not see Li Sun as he quietly closed the door.

The door to the north was unlocked as well. But the occupants of this room were on high alert. They spotted him immediately. He slammed the door and retreated through the portal behind him.

Once he was back with the rest of his team, he reported what he had seen in his brief glimpse into the Shrine of Vecna:

A statue of Vecna, crafted from iron and very large. A skeletal figure in robes, missing its left eye and left hand.

A symbol of Vecna, crafted as a mosaic into the floor in the center of this minor temple. A severed hand holding and eyeball.

Four crystal pillars, crafted from crystalline rock. Arrayed about the room.

Two brazier, crafted of brass. Providing garish shadows to the lighting.

An Idol of Vecna, crafted from black rock. Fashioned into a giant skull with an eye set in its right socket. The left socket is empty.

He told his teammates of the occupants who spotted him:

Several Norkers, the creatures who resembled hobgoblins who had been plaguing them since they had entered the Tower of Mysteries (some were armed with slings, some with flails); and

At least one cloaked figure which resembled the Enigmas of Vecna they had already fought.

After his Infernal Machine Is Destroyed...

…Paldemar Makes a Brief Appearance…

…and promises to kill those who have foiled his plans.

Jonalith heard clanking noises ahead which Li Sun and Lagolas could not seem to detect. So he quietly proceeded down the wide corridor from which they emerged. Peeking around a corner he saw a large bronze machine marching inexorably toward the party.

“Some kind of guard device,” he thought.

Didn’t take long to figure out the Bronze Warder could shove pretty much anybody out of it’s way. At first Jonalith thought he could hide behind a teammate and throw magic daggers at it.

But the bronze creature would charge him every time. And, if Lagolas was in the way, it would knock him to the ground.

Lag was spending a lot of time on the floor.

Just when Jon realized the big bronze behemoth could not charge between the pillars around the teleportation circle, the doors on the other side of the corridor opened up and two more creature started pot-shotting him: Another Enigma of Vecna and a goblinoid of some sort.

This put an end to any plans Jonalith had of hiding behind the pillars and taking some pot shots of his own. “Sure, I could wear the Bronze Warder with him being able to get at me. But those other two would do the same to me.”

Amyria looked to the assassin in anticipation. She had sent Blackguard’s Bane to seek out Li Sun and Sun, along with the rest of their team. “They should be about finished with the slavers in Thunderspire,” she suggested. She had already sent Tokk’it ahead to scout the island nation of Nefalus, with one of Belinda’s teleportation circles inscribed on the deck of his ship.

Li Sun saw that the Norker was opening the door for the Enigma, and the Enigma was sniping with impunity. So he rushed the door the next time it opened and discovered what was inside the room.

An Infernal Machine of some sort was standing near the center the table around the room were covered with bottles. “Looks like acid to me,” he thought.

This was confirmed a few moments later when Jonalilth joined him in the laboratory. When Jon missed a swing, he knocked over some bottles and was burned by their contents.

Meanwhile, Lagolas was still getting knocked over by the Bronze Warder, which had followed them into the lab.

Blackguard’s Bane told Amyria, “They discovered a complication. After they mopped up the Duergar slavers they found evidence they were working with someone who was trying to take over the Mages of Saruun. Or maybe take over from the Mages. That led them to a bunch of evil-worshipping Gnolls. The leader of the Gnolls apparently knew who was out to get rid of the other Mages. Paldemar, one of their own. Now they are trying clear him out of his fortress.”

Tired of constantly getting knocked back down, Lagolas decided to try firing from the floor. His burning spray was able to hit all three of his adversaries, so he started trying out his more powerful spells.

It didn’t take long for the three adventurers to clear out the lab.

Then they took a closer look at the Infernal Machine. The others could not make heads or tails of the large, glass container. But Lagolas had a good idea once he saw the head of a Bronze Warder floating inside. The tubes and pipes were obviously designed to help keep the head alive.

But, Lagolas saw the ritual that was being prepared, he knew this machine was almost ready for a far more sinister purpose: taking control of all the Bronze Warders in the Thunderspire Labyrinth and deposing the Mages of Saruun.

For the Mages used these bronze contraptions to rule. Lagolas wasn’t certain how good their rule was.

But it had to be better than rule by a cult dedicated to Vecna.

He convinced the others to let him destroy the Infernal Machine, and they hid behind the lab tables. A good thing, too, since the machine’s acrid, glowing green liquid sprayed all around when it burst.

It didn’t take Paldemar long to realize the ritual had been stopped. As soon as the machine was destroyed, he teleported into the room to see who had done the damage.

“Oh, you shall die for this!” was all he said before teleporting away again.

Joins the Party...

…and is immediately gunned down…

Ragnar the Mighty lowered his head and charged the pillar that had attacked him, but Wicked Fang seemed unimpressed.

“That’s nothing but stone, you fool,” the sword whispered. “You have to find the source of the attack.”

So Ragnar charge southward. There he found Norker minions pouring from yet another portal. And he was also attacked by stouter goblinoids with battleaxes. And he began to wish he had spent a little more time practicing his defenses.

But LI Sun’s healing was not keeping up with the damage he has taking.

Ragnar began to suspect he was going to need his battle rage.

Valna discussed the Order of the Black Feather with the Lord Warden of Fallcrest and became convinced the Order had been infiltrated by at least one agent of The Winter Court. Even the warden’s intelligence officers seemed certain of this. He decided the best way to keep an eye on them was to offer his services, taking care of their mounts. These Trihorn Behemoths had been taken into The Thunderspire Labyrinth by members of the Order who were clearing the place of slavers for the Lord Warden. Once he got to the Seven-Pillared Hall the huge beasts weren’t hard to find, stabled at an inn run by a local hobbit.

At first, Jon the Elf thought holing up in the small room he had discovered was the best strategy. They searched the room for any sign of the creatures who were attacking through the pillars. But they found nothing.

Jonalith could see that they could defend the doorway well enough. But, as long as the pillars could attack them with impunity, they would eventually be worn down.

After Ragnar attempted to scout the portal from which the Norkers were emerging, Jon came to the conclusion they had to search the room on the other side of the portal.

Valna of the Moonstair introduced himself to the halfling who brought in Blackguard’s Bane. The revenant took Valna to a secret door on the Road of Lanterns and showed him where Li Sun and the others had gone. Once Valna went through a test of his lore, he found himself surrounded by pillars which were casting lightning bolts at him. And other magicks as well. By the time he caught up with the Order of the Black Feather, he was on his last legs.

Li Sun was glad to see help arrive. But the elven ranger did not look to be in any better shape that the rest of the new recruits.

In fact, he slumped unconscious from the blasts emanating from the pillars shortly after appearing from around the corner.

“Oh, well,” sighed the ardent, “I guess I better heal him as well.”

By this time, Ragnar and Jonalith had discovered Enigmas of Vecna holed up in the other room.

“Surely, these are the creatures who have potshotting us through the pillars,” he thought.

Once they had surrounded the strange creatures, this theory was confirmed. In a most unfortunate manner. Once the Enigmas were bloodied, they exploded into a cloud of horrific visages and then rushed in a flesh-ripper rage.

As Explained by Two Demons...

…to a Goblin.

Li Sun looked over the Revenant, the Minotaur, and the Elf who had joined him. The only one he knew was the elf who had brought him their mounts. An odd mix, but he was glad Amyria had sent them. Ki’sho and Sun Li were in no shape to do battle with an archmage after the fights they had with the Gnolls and their demonic friends.

Apparently one of the Mages of Saruun had gone rogue and was trying to take over. He was using the Duergar and Gnolls to accomplish some secret plan.

But Li Sun had the key. And the key seemed to know where it wanted to go. First it led them to the Seven-Pillared Hall, then to the Road of Lanterns, and finally to this nondescript portion of that road.

Where they found a keyhole.

Li Sun placed the key in the keyhole and a secret door opened. Revealing a long passage, which led to a room with a circle of teleportation inscribed in its center. When Drake walked up to it, the circle turned out to have some powers of summoning as well. A spectral figure, clad in thick robes of the deepest scarlet appeared in a blinding flash. It was missing its left hand. And, while an eye filled the right socket in its spectral head (really little more than a skull, from what Li Sun could see), the left socket was empty.

“The secrets of the tower come at a price. You must each pay for the right to enter this place. What can you offer to the dreaded Lord of Secrets? I seek lore, power, and your souls.”

“L’esprit de L’escalier,”Ambassador Tien told the goblin cheiftain, “is the spirit of the staircase.” Takin was thoroughly confused by this, so Tien explained. “You see, the high elves who originated the expression often held their balls high up in the forest on platforms perched in the trees or hanging from the branches. To get up to these woody ballrooms, they had to climb long, ornate staircases. And to leave the ball they had to descend the same stairs. They noticed that sometimes they did not think of the perfect retort for their rivals’ insults until they were leaving the ball when their wit did them no good. I suspect something like this is happening to the four members of the Golden Scales who failed to protect their souls from the Spirit of Vecna.”

Ragnar the Mighty avoided being blinded by the flash of light — admittedly by fleeing, but this gave him his chance…

…so he charged the thing he feared.

As Wicked Fang passed harmlessly through the apparition’s gut, the Spirit of Vecna laughed. “You cannot intimidate me because you cannot harm me!”

“So, what was it you wanted?” Ragnar asked, somewhat meekly.

“Fool! Only three things will get you into the Tower of Mysteries: lore, power or your souls.”

Li Sun tried a bit of history, but it turned out to be something the spirit already knew. And Drake whispered to the others: “It cannot be intimidated, enjoys flattery, and is susceptible to well-told lies. The lore it seeks is arcane lore, historical lore and religious lore.”

Ragnar decided to try a little flattery. At first, his compliments were a little too subtle for the apparition. It thought he was trying to intimidate it again. But once it realized he was commenting on its powers, it seemed to be pleased.

Drake ran into a similar problem when he tried to compliment the spirit on its ability to pretend to be a ghost. At first, the apparition was confused more than flattered.

“I’m trying to say I’m impressed!” the blackguard raged. And eventually Ragnar thought it mollified, if not totally impressed by the compliment.

Li Sun switched to arcane lore, but the Spirit of Vecna was no more impressed by it than by the historical tidbet Ragnar tried next: “What is my true name?”

“Ragnarok!” shrieked the spirit. That was an easy one."

Alen saw that Takin was still not getting it. “Any of them coulda mentioned that the Raven Queen appears to be working with a certain Platinum Dragon. She’s been trying to keep that quiet, so there’s a good chance Vecna wouldn’t know it. And even if he knew it, he might not have shared it with all his minions. The Spirit mighta thought he could really impress his boss with dat kinda info. Any of dem adventurers who thought about it after was probably kickin’ demselves for not thinkin’ of it in time. Dat’s the Spirit of the Stairwell.”

Jonalith watched his friends struggle with the difficult task of coming up with things Vecna did not know. It was hard. Vecna was, after all, the Master of Secrets. Jonalith had difficulty coming up with things such a master would not know.

But he did have friends who knew many secrets. Samwise and Jerath had come to the court of Fallcrest during the time he was there. And Sam shared the secrets of a weapon that he coveted. He had told Jon about the Darkblade of Melegaunt and its origins.

“Did you know the Darkblade of Melegaunt is a dagger made of shimmering black glass?” he asked the apparition.

“Why, yes, I did,” the spirit replied. “In fact, I know that it’s tip trails shadowy tendrils as it seeks its target’s most vulnerable spots.”

“But… but did you know it was forged in a Pact with a prince of Netheril?”

“Hmm, no, I did not. Perhaps Vecna himself knows, but I will have to take this knowledge to him to find out. This is truly lore which might be of use.”

After Ragnar failed another historical lore gambit, Jonalith saw Li Sun was taking another tack while sticking to the Well of Demons theme. “I would have thought such a spirit as yourself would have known all about Maldrick Scarmaker’s death.”

“Well, yes. But now I do.” The Spirit of Vecna seemed to be impressed by the backhanded compliment, but Jon was worried the effectiveness of flattery might soon be coming to end.

“You can only do so much of that kind of thing,” he thought, "before it becomes obvious.

Takin the Scared finally thought he had it. "So dese hot-shot adventurers been goin’ around discoverin’ all dese secrets? And den dey can’t even remember ‘em when it counts? Dat’s what dis “spirit” thing is all about? Kinda like when some troll insults me in front of da boss and I don’t think to call him a snotnose until later. Even though I can see the snot when I’m standing right dere. OK, OK. I gets it. But what I don’t get is why you two keep talkin’ about the stairs. Dere aren’t any stairs in dat tower."

Drake the Enforcer was impressed when Li Sun showed the map to the Well of Demons to the spectre. So he tried another bit of lore about the well. “And the guardian of the well, a green dragon, is now dead!”

“Dead? I did not know that.”

Jonalith told a story about a new religion rising up around Amyria. At first he thought the was making something up, but as the details emerged it became clear he was talking about the worshipful attitude some of the Githzerai were taking toward the Deva paladin. And the spirit seemed genuinely impressed with this lore.

Drake noticed Ragnar was whispering to his sword. Suddenly the Minotaur looked up and shouted, “I bet you do not know the role that the Raven Queen played in creating my sword.”

“You mean the power she channeled from Drake’s curse, empowering it and giving it a life of its own?” smirked the Spirit of Vecna. “Anyone who worships Vecna could see that as soon as they saw your blade. We are not so ignorant of matters arcane and religious as you. It is obvious that you and your friends have no more to offer the Lord of Secrets. I will leave you your powers, and simply take a bit of your souls.”

As the apparition disappeared, Drake felt a small portion of his reserves dwindle. But he knew that he had some left.

And he heard the spirit’s last words in his head, “You may now enter the Tower of Mysteries. May its secrets intrigue you.”

Hearing that, Drake stepped into the circle. And was teleported into another room in a blinding flash. He was standing in the middle of a 20-foot-by-20-foot room with two exits — one north and one west. The walls of this chamber are covered with carvings that depict human faces. Each face is wearing either a blindfold or a gag.

Drake noticed that, as soon as he stepped through, all the blindfolded faces animated and began to chant. All the gagged faces seemed to animate as well, but they simply glared at the interlopers as each of his companions materialized in the circle in the middle of the room.

To the north and to the west, Drake saw pillars in the corridors beyond. These were also covered with carvings of faces, but these faces were different. No gags; no blindfolds. Each face seemed to be missing one eye.

They did not seem to be animated like those in the room Drake was standing in. But every once in a while he seemed to see one animate out of the corner of his eye. As so as he looked at the one which he thought was animating, it froze again as stone.

Spreading Rumors Throughout the Former Empire...

…of the Dragonborn.

Strangely enough, though, the rumors all seem to be about the Great Gark and his interest in another ancient empire: that of the Minotaurs of Thunderspire Labyrinth.

Sun Li turned to her twin. “I think you better go investigate that noise. I am wounded, but I can still go through these papers we found on the Gnoll.” When Li Sun was gone, she examined the map, which seemed to show a secret tower built into Thunderspire itself. “Hmmm, maps are always a good thing in a Minotaur labyrinth.” The rest of the papers seemed to be letters from a wizard who was plotting against the Mages of Saruun. “He may even have infiltrated their order,” Sun Li mused. “He seems to have been quite open about his plans when writing to his Gnollish ally.”

“I have a job for one of your imps,” Amyria told Maxim Shalion, "the one who can send messages. I need him to convince some of our Dragonborn allies to go to Thunderspire Labyrinth. Then she told him the names: Lagolas and Andrea Ravn. “I believe they will play a great role in the events to come. I would prefer you not mention this task to the other members of The Golden Scales.”

“Are they within 100 miles of here?” Maxim asked, remembering the limitation on the distance he could send Ambassador Tien.

“Yes, one of them is in the mountains east of Fallcrest. That one is a sorceror who has lost his family. The other, Andrea, is a Warlord who may be able to help Li Sun with some complications she has run into.”

“Complications?”

“Belinda’s father sent Li Sun and his twin sister to clean up a slaver problem, but it has turned into a bit more than just some Duergar slave trading. I need your ambassador imp to convince them to go to The Seven-Pillared Hall in Thunderspire to meet up with Li Sun and Sun Li.”

“Gladly. If it will help The Great Gark.”

“The Great Gark — and, indeed, all of us — will profit from thwarting the plans of someone who worships Vecna. But, remember, your average Dragonborn is a strong believer in ancient honor. They may not react the way you might when a demon appears, trying to tell them what to do.”

A grin began to spread across Maxim’s face. “Then I can tell them whatever I want?”

“As long as it gets them to Thunderspire,” Amyria sighed.

And Maxim began whisper to the air about the Great Gark and his plans.

A rampaging Minotaur was the last thing Li Sun was expecting to find in the Well of Demons, but that was what she found. “I guess it was built by the creatures,” she admitted to herself. And he did seem to have a pretty impressive magic sword. She explained what was going on and they decided to join forces against Paldemar.

Andrea Ravn was not impressed with what she had seen of Lagolas so far. He came stumbling out of the mountains, raving about an attack on Andrea’s village, an attack he seemed to think had already happened. When Andrea pointed this out, he started rambling about a demon who had told him the Great Gark was attacking the village.

“You believe everything a demon tells you?” she asked the sorcerer.

“Well, no…” the interloper started. Just then he was interrupted by the sudden appearance of an imp, just like the one Lagolas had described. “That’s him!”

“Ambassador Tien, at your service,” the imp said. “Well, actually, at the service of the Great Gark and HIS servant, Maxim Shalion. They had information the two of you could help the enemies of the Great Gark and his ally.”

Andrea was puzzled. “Ally?”

“Well, the Great Gark has entered into an alliance of convenience with some minion of Vecna. Kind of a poser, if you ask me, but he serves the purposes the Great Gark has created for him.”

Seeing the demon could be drawn out with questions, Andrea asked him why he had lied about the attack on her village. And the imp laughed.

“That was just to keep you two away from Thunderspire. Now, Paldemar can take over.”

After an Epic Fight...

…Which Left Grigore and Valhalla Near Death…

…Delis was able to lead Lord Torrance to the true location of the Tower of Auglos.

Zumos was a little annoyed with Valhalla for charging right into the other side of the stained-glass globe and attacking the figures performing a ritual in there.

“I thought the plan was for me to light up the inside of the device while we still had surprise.”

Fortunately Zumos was able to let loose an area-of-effect spell that did not include the half-orc. Not that he wouldn’t have minded a little collateral damage as punishment for messing up the carefully laid plans.

As soon as he attacked the group inside, he found his spell damaging the interior of the device.

And it retaliated. First at Zumos himself. Then at everybody, including the robed ritualists. Those Githyanki seemed almost relieved to be doing something besides the ritual which had consumed their lives for the past few months.

They turned on Valhalla and attacked him with considerable success.

Remembering that Garen had mentioned two friends who lived near Thunderspire Labyrinth, Amyria tried to think how she could get a message to the swamps and mountains of the ancient Dragonborn Empire. She wasn’t sure Belinda had a portal there (and her father might not approve, especially if Garen’s story about treacherous paladins was true). Then she thought of Maxim.

Valhalla kept forgetting to use his Power Strike, but it didn’t seem to matter. Every enemy he hit went down in a single blow of his executioner’s axe.

“Must be because everybody else is bloodying them before I get to them.”

Seeking out Maxim Shalion at the River Jewel, Amyria explained the situation to him. “We need to get a message to two dragonborn. They are less than 100 miles away, and they are close to Thunderspire Labyrinth. I need you to send a message to them. Their names are Lagolas and Andrea.”

Grigore Goldforge shook his head as he watched Valhalla charging all over the place, cursing everyone in sight.

He found his healing powers being taxed to the limits by the enormous amount of damage being dealt out by the globe itself. “What was it the ritualists had called it? ‘The Bitter Glass,’ or something?”

He concentrated his attacks on the glass itself, discovering he could even hit it from outside the sphere by reaching his longspear through the door and driving it downward into the curve of the sphere beneath the glass platform which stretched across the inside.

When the Bitter Glass finally shattered, a surge of psychic energy made one final attack on his mind. He felt it seize some of his memories and spirit them off to the Astral Sea.

“A place I’ve only been once,” he thought. “But somehow I can tell that’s where they went.”

As soon as it was gone, the doors crashed open. “I guess Garen’s makeshift blockade didn’t work.” There stood Kle’th, Telicanthus and his butler, along with another Githyanki warrior.

As the new opponents advanced toward the Golden Scales, saw Valhalla charge the enemy one more time. And collapse in a heap as the psychic damage from the Githyanki rained down upon him.

One more time. But, as Grigore prepared to heal the half-orc, he found himself the target of the psychic attacks. And he went unconscious.

As he struggled back to the land of the living, vaguely aware of how close he had come to death, he saw Sam pouring a potion down Valhalla’s throat.

“I better play dead until I can get up and do something constructive.” But Valhalla was doing no such thing. As soon as he was conscious, he began spewing threat and curses at Telicanthus.

Valhalla got one last shot in. This time he remembered to use his Power Strike. It took down Telicanthus. But the other enemies poured their attacks onto Valhalla and he went down a third time.

Sam turned to Grigore and shrugged his shoulders, "I figure that potion protected me from all those attacks.

“What’s so important about Andrea and Lagolas?” Maxim asked Amyria. She told him that they both lived near Thunderspire Labyrinth. “What’s so important about Thunderspire?” he asked. And she told him the story of Paine, and the strange twins, Li Sun and Sun Li.

Delis Erinthal knew the battle was going badly. “Our healer is down, and Valhalla is down. But the important thing is that Telicanthus has been exposed.”

Apparently, the Githyanki diplomat had been here all along to rebuild the giant stained-glass globe they just destroyed. Once it was gone, he gave up all pretense and his true nature came out.

“A particularly arrogant nature, if you ask me,” Delis thought. “He seems unaware of the possibility he might lose this fight. And he might be right.”

Delis was convinced of the most important thing: “We must get to Lord Torrance and see that he sees this. That is more important than making sure we all survive. The knowledge must survive.” So she turned invisible and made her way to the nearest town guard.

The guard was only too willing to take her to the mansion of the ruler of Sayre. (The only other option she offered was to break into the mansion of one of the city’s leading citizens and enter an illegal excavation to “see for yourself.”) Lord Torrance seemed almost relieved by the news of Telicanthus’s treachery. They gathered a group of four guards to accompany them to the scene of the treason.

When they got to Telicanthus’s mansion, the front door was unlocked (as Delis had left it) and they were able to make their way to the underground excavation. As soon as he saw the illegal digging operation, Delis could tell he was buying her story.

“Auglos apparently had a secret project he was building underneath his tower. It may even have had something to do with the destruction of Auglos itself,” she told Torrance. “Telicanthus has rebuilt the project as a kind of communications device, which he has been using to coordinate the Githyanki attacks all over this plane of existence.”

As they sifted through the treasure they found on the bodies, Delis wondered if they had found enough gold to buy the armor for Maggie to which Fariex the Scalehammer had directed them.

Andor and Toris Scrollstone, two dwarven mapmakers Lord Torrance had summoned, were able to confirm this was the true location of the Tower of Auglos. They immediately fell to arguing with the half-elf about relocating the plaque commemorating the location of the tower.

At their Leisure...

…But Kle’th Escapes to Warn Telecanthus

Once the element of surprise was gone, Delis Erinthal found herself on the far side of the Tower of Auglos, near a foul-smelling latrine. Maxim had managed to trap a couple on her side of his globe of blackness and silver-winged death, but she was having her way with them, avoiding them to her stealth and speed while she plinked away at them with her magickal arrows.

They concentrated their fire through Maxim’s conjuration, even though it hampered them somewhat.

The Minotaur listened to Amyria as she explained her dilemma, “I am about hold a meeting with the Coalition to discuss all manner of delicate issues. The rest of the Golden Scales will be there to help me, so I cannot send them. But there are other elements of ”/wikis/the-order-of-the-black-feather" class=“wiki-page-link”> The Order of the Black Feather who can help Bejam. Go to Elyas in Overlook and ask him to find them. That way Lord Torrance’s jealousy will not interfere with the need to help Nefalus."

Maxim Shalion kept up his Hunger of Hadar even once the area around the table he centered it on was evacuated. The globe was serving his purposes even after it no longer dealt damage.

His own melee attack wasn’t much use. He just wasn’t very good at hitting things up close. And he had to hit first to unleash his Demonic Frenzy. “What good is being a Demon if you can’t unleash your frenzy every now and then?” he asked himself.

Alen was certainly enjoying being a demon, turning invisible and appearing where he could bite the Githyanki. If only Maxim could figure out why Ambassador Tien was not returning with a response from the Great Gark.

“Maybe Alen could be used more effectively,” he thought.

Elyas told Ragnar that the name of his contact in the Order was Blackguard’s Bane, “He should be able to send you to wherever Li Sun and Sun Li are currently hanging out. He has ways. Last I heard they were in a place called The Horned Hold.”

The healing powers of Grigore Goldforge were being put to the test. With the Githyanki warriors leaping about attacking almost everyone, there was always someone in trouble. Especially when they had been immobilized first.

Garen seemed to be particularly vulnerable to this, and Grigore was glad his spear-thrusts were hitting. That allowed him to get some extra healing in.

“The Horned Hold?” Blackguard’s Bane asked when the Minotaur barbarian found him at the Order’s headquarters. “No, I think they’ve gone deeper into The Thunderspire Labyrinth. Belinda Markelhay should be able to take you there. But I suggest you ask her father first. He’s Lord Warden of Fallcrest. You might need to help them finish that work before you can get them on a boat to Nefalus.”

Zumos saw the leader of the Githyanki heading for the exits and knew he was trying to alert Lord Telicanthus and the butler.

He moved quickly to block the way, but the other Githyanki seemed to sense the need to get reinforcements. They pointed their fingers at Kle’th and telekinetically aided their leader in his escape.

When the battle was over and the bodies quickly searched, Elyas told them all to rest up quickly. “We only have a short time before Lord Telicanthus gets here. He has surely been alerted.”

Beneath the Mansion of Lord Telicanthus...

…Excavations Have Exhausted the Excavators…

…a group of Githyanki, working in shifts, sleeping in their armor, and complaining about the rituals they must constantly keep chanting.

Sam the Foresworn found three other members of the Golden Scales fighting over strategy. Valhalla was forcefully arguing for a burn-them-all strategy; Zumos was in favor of freeze-them-to-the-ground, then burn-them-all.

Which to Sam’s way of thinking was a little more strategically oriented. They all explained there were two groups of Githyanki (at least) in the tunnels beneath Telicanthus’s mansion. The first group (apparently trying to get some rest) were camped in a major intersection of the tunnels. The next group were getting ready for work a little farther in. The tactical puzzle was how to finish off the first group without letting them sound an alarm or retreat back to where their reinforcements were waiting.

Garen was advocating another way to keep the two crews of Githyanki separated: He wanted to get between the two groups and force them away from each other. But that sounded to Zumos a lot like getting too close to the group they were trying to get away from.

“Why don’t we have a stealthy individual sneak into the middle of the room where they’re sleeping, suddenly appear, express surprise, and then run,” he suggested.

“Yeah,” said the paladin, “you can lure them back down this narrow corridor and we can fight them there.”

Sam noticed Garen was assuming the “stealthy individual” would be Sam himself. Which was what he was hoping.

“Who says it has to be the passage back to the surface?” he asked. “What if I lead them off down one of these other corridors? Then you can come in behind them and seal them off from their friends.”

“Yeah, that makes sense,” agreed Zumos.

“I still say we just burn them all,” Valhalla said.

Sam modified the plan once he was facing a roomful of enemies. He stopped at the doorway and asked directions. The Githyanki didn’t answer, but got up to attack him. Sam attacked first with a backstab and then dodged around to one of the side tunnels he had noticed on the map provided by Maggie and Delis.

The Githyanki surrounded him there. But he used an Escape Artist’s Trick to get away and then ran down one of the branching tunnels. He made sure they saw where he went before he hid at the end of the tunnel.

The guard at the gate behind the mansion thought he heard something. “Sounds almost like breaking twigs,” he said to himself. “Better check the perimeter.” He started walking along the hedge.

Sam’s plan was working too well, by Zumos’s way of thinking. Sure, he got off his first fireball in a way that caught all four of the Githyanki in its blast. But after that his area-of-effect spells were hard to use.

Once Sam used his Escape Artist’s Trick to get away from the Githyanki who had surrounded him in a side tunnel, the little halfling ran very visibly down the side tunnel. The Githyanki all saw him run down the “wrong” tunnel: They all knew it was a dead end, and they thought they had him cornered.

Apparently he had hidden so well they came out bickering about who had “lost” the hobbit and split up to find him down another dead-end tunnel. This allowed the Golden Scales to concentrate on one opponent at a time.

“Good tactics, but sub-optimal for a pyromancer who specializes in area-of-effect bursts and blasts,” he thought to himself as he readied another Arc Lightning bolt.

But the Githyanki Mindslicers were pretty well able to stop his big spells anyway, even in their exhausted state. Their Psychic Barrages addled his brain sufficiently to prevent anything more complicated than Arc Lightning.

Zumos was glad he had got the big Fireball off before they started messing his mind.

Valhalla didn’t need any advanced techniques. Battle Wrath was as basic as basic could be. As long as he kept swinging his executioners axe, his basic attack was all he needed.

Of course, in the moments when his brain wasn’t addled by the Githyanki, he could always throw in a Power Strike if he hit. With his executioner’s axe that always knocked ’em down.

But knocking someone down was not as effective when they had telekinetic powers which allowed them to leap back to their feet while flying across the room. Fortunately, they were too busy looking for the halfling. As each one gave up the search, they came out of the side tunnels one at a time.

And Valhalla was glad to knock them down. One at a time.

Sure enough, the gate guard was already checking out a hole in the hedge when Pennel came to tell him about the noise and damage he had found in the hedge himself. “I heard these sticks breaking.” When Pennel asked him about the clanking sound, the guard insisted he heard nothing like the sound of heavy plate armor banging together. When he told the guard to accompany him to Telicanthus’s office, Pennel reached into his pocket and discovered the key was missing.

Garen Bladerun was worried about the last Githyanki. His job was making sure the warrior did not alert his allies in the next room. But he did not see how he could do that when the Githyanki all seemed to have the power to perform telekinetic leaps.

Then he saw his chance. The Githyanki leaped in front of a side tunnel and Garen charged him, driving him back into the narrow passage. Valhalla seized the opportunity and missed. Zumos damaged him with Arc Lightning and Sam almost killed him.

That left the paladin with a chance to finish him off. A single Holy Strike brought the Gith down. And Garen was glad to feel the soul of the slaver being sucked into his helm.

Searching the bodies, they were all disappointed to find no treasure.

“I guess when you’re working underground for months at a time, unable to show your green faces in the city above, you don’t need any money,” Garen thought to himself. “Maybe I should use this guy’s soul to kill his boss. That’s where the treasure will be found.”

The Contents of the Books...

…Which Once Made Up the Library Below the Temple of Ioun…

…in the ancient city of Augur had been haphazardly inscribed by insane librarians on the walls of their accidental tomb.

“A matrix of blown glass can be formed into a mathematically perfect sounding chamber, then used to amplify magical resonance. In theory, disconnected sheets of a similar substance can be attuned to the master. This would allow communication at unlimited distance. The question is: How can one handle the planar boundary? When I began this research in Nefelus, I never expected that this would be a concern…”
—from the diaries of Auglos of Nefelus

Brother Pinnot was not sure he liked his latest assignment. The Abbot had been very convincing: “You’re to record every word. Graiden Brackenhaus is the oracular guest of Seer Auglos. The Seer is an oracle in his own right, but he is trying to make Augur the greatest font of prophecy ever seen. The Temple of Ioun is honored to be a part of this historic effort.”

But the young monk found it hard to believe Brackenhaus’s ravings were anything but the rant of a madman. Take what he was writing down now: “You’re watching me. I can see you, but you don’t know that. You’re listening to my words even though I’m long dead." He tried to explain to Graiden that he was listening. He was even writing everything down, as fast as he could. And, obviously, the oracular guest himself was not dead.

“A problem has developed. I need some method for shunting away the psychic residue cast off during communication. This seems to be quite toxic. I believe that I can redirect it into the Astral Sea, where it should do no harm to anyone…”
—from the diaries of Auglos of Nefelus

Graiden Brackenhaus grew impatient with the scribe who had been assigned to him. “No, not you! Idiot.” Didn’t the monk understand what prophesying was all about? “You’re just writing down my words because you were told to by the old man with a beard and a magic glass. I’m talking to the other people, the ones reading this on the wall. They know I’m dead. Oh yes, dead, mud in my mouth, river arisen! I sing of a ship that sails the air, that brings swords and fire. You’ve fought it, too, but it’s worse for you. We’re just going to die.”

“The final Glass is more beautiful than I could have hoped. My apprentices have outdone themselves. A full 30 feet in diameter, it has anchored itself into the very nature of our plane, and hangs in space. Our ritual went flawlessly and it has taken on a life of its own; as thoughts travel from one external pane to another, the Glass shimmers like the night sky. It is quite beautiful. It seems to be invulnerable from the outside, as I intended, but the same protections have not transferred into the interior. This worries me.”
—from the diaries of Auglos of Nefelus

Seeing that was what the crazy prophet wanted, Brother Pinnot returned to his scribing: “They’ll kill us all because of what the bearded man does, talking through the mirror. They’ll just flood the room, and that will solve their problem until he finds it again.” The monk noticed the emphasis on that word — “he” — and decided it might mean someone other than the “bearded man,” but he had no way to indicate that in his transcription. This was hardly the time to be thinking about the limitations of Amanuensis.

“The interior of the Glass becomes a psychic maelstrom if the information flow is not redirected. I have succeeded in rerouting the rogue energies to the Astral Sea. So long as no one is bothered by them, I see no risk; and in such a plane, what are the chances that they will be discovered? So small as to be infinitesimal…”
—from the diaries of Auglos of Nefelus

Graiden was deep into his prophecy now, directly addressing the people he could see reading his words: “He’s been looking for it a long time. You think he likes you but it’s a lie. There was digging, you see, and cleaning, and many false leads. He’ll use it to conquer you all, but no one will believe you. You’ll have to prove him a liar.”

Now he was beginning to feel hungry. People don’t seem to understand that these visions were hard work. But he continued anyway, addressing the readers only he could see: "They can talk through it, you see. They’ve managed to do it, and the armies whisper through the blue darkness in a way that no one else can hear. You’re dead if you don’t stop it. Even now they are discussing you. ‘Distract them,’ he is told, ‘this is too important to ruin.’ But you can.

The hunger was too much: “Boy! Boy, I demand a goose! Pluck it and ruin it and save yourself if you find the right spot.” The fool kept on writing, but eventually took the hint and brought him a goose. Couldn’t save himself in time, Graiden thought.

So he continued the prophecy: "Look for the old tower when no one expects you. It isn’t where they think it is. Ask the dwarves if you like, the brothers who dream of maps. Because in the days to come SHE will spread herself, and none will be safe from HER reach, so you may wish to trust the speech of the Bladed Girl. Trust, trust her if no one else. If her people do not come together, they will certainly be ripped apart. Like my goose? I am so very hungry. I could use some tea. Boy!”

“I am making only a few select panes linked to the glass, but it would be just as simple to make many. I expect that selling these to far-flung allies could make me a rich man indeed. I will need to consider it.”
—from the diaries of Auglos of Nefelus

After they had gleaned all they could from the walls of the library, Delis Erinthal and Maggie infiltrated the mansion of Telicanthus. Grigore insisted on providing a distraction by pretending he was late for the tea party. (Well, he was, but that was another story.)

By the time Delis had forced her way through the hedge, Magdalene had already unlocked the back door and was balanced on the door frame. Above the door and hugging the wall. They made their way inside and found Telicanthus’s office was empty. Maggie used her oval-shaped piece of glass to open the secret mirror-door and they descended to the tunnels which Telicanthus and his minions had dug beneath the city.

They found several abandoned tunnels and some exhausted workers. The tired Githyanki complained about their isolation, wondering when their work would be done. Maggie turned herself into a Githyanki and trudged past with similar remarks.

When she came back, she had finished their map:

Well, almost finished it, anyway. They were pretty sure the last tunnel was another dead end.

All the Books Are Gone

Behind the pile of rubble blocking the door to Ioun’s old library…

…the Golden Scales found scribes in search of knowledge. A search so desperate they were willing to steal it from the minds of others.

Garen Bladerun could see letters forming on the chest of the undead scribe before him…something about Fariex and Quelenna. Negotiations on a unified military command. He knew it must have happened at the Coalition meeting. But he could not remember it actually happening.

To Zumos, it almost felt like he was being picked upon. Sure, Garen was taking the brunt of it, but that was the way it was supposed to happen.

He kept trying to step back — out of the Barrages of Knowledge that left him dazed with strange and ancient thoughts. But he had to see his target to launch his own barrages — his were fiery, of course — and he could not get back out of range. Using his limited teleporting ability worked once, but it was not enough.

He was taking damage even faster than the paladin.

Grigore Goldforge had just been thinking about his dreamquest. The Lost Rangers. But now he could not remember the dream. As if someone had stolen the memories from his mind. The Bone Scribe which was attacking him! It smiled as letters appeared on its chest. The words described Grigore going to sleep and dreaming the dreams of his uncle….

Sam the Foresworn could see what the wizard’s mistake was. They were all bunched up. He should have used that teleport to get past the undead archivists, just like Maggie had done.

Well, Sam didn’t have a teleport, but he was good at hit-and-run, which was working well for Delis — dang, the elf hadn’t a scratch on her body.

So, Sam darted in and attacked. And — just as the Bone Archivist was expecting him to run back to the corridor where Zumos and Delis hid — he raced on past and got behind the creatures who had been trapped for so long in this library.

> Accessing restricted files…Magdalene felt a sense of deja vu. This had all happened to her before. The letters appearing on the skin of the creature before her were taken from her own mind, just as…awakened by a knock on the door, she saw a dragon…—ERROR——-Intrusion Detected———DISCONNECTING——

Delis Erinthal saw Zumos headed her past her, but she had some sympathy: The wizard was on his last legs. Unfortunately, a Bone Archivist got past Garen to drop another barrage of ancient lore into their minds.

Knowing this blast might drop Zumos, Delis turned into the psychic attack and stared right back into those undead eyes. She could see the archivist shaking as it raised its sharpened fingerbones to its skull. Her eyes blazed as the attack came at her.

The undead creature’s head explode and Delis could hear the sigh of relief behind her. But Sam was calling for everyone to come inside and spread out. “Right up my alley,” Delis thought. “Time for the old Cut and Run.”

Once they adopted Sam’s tactics it was easy to finish off the crazed horde. Everybody said they were glad to get their memories back as the writing on the corpses faded — something Delis didn’t really understand: Her mind had never been touched.

When they found no loot, several party members began to grouse about the lack of treasure, but Zumos was having none of that.

“No treasure?” the wild-eyed wizard shouted. “There’s treasure all around us!” Following his gestures, Delis realized what he was talking about.

All the original scrolls and books had turned to dust, but the contents of the original books had been transcribed on the walls of the library . . . somewhat. Many of the sentences are in no discernable order. As the librarians grew more insane and the walls began to fill up, they wrote sentences on top of sentences anywhere they could find room.

The result was confusing and time-consuming to comprehend. But it might be possible to do some research here.

Telicanthus Has His Illegal Excavations Revealed

And They Appear to Lead to the Ancient Ruins of Augur.

Awakened by a knock on her door, Magdalene peered through the tiny hole she had drilled in the door to her room at the River Jewel. Not very surprised to see Fariex on the other side, she told the dragon (who was still using some kind of magic to appear as a human trader) that she needed a moment to freshen up.

Fariex asked her to meet him in the garden just next to the posh inn, so she soon found herself discussing the Filth King surrounded by sculptures and flowers. Seems the king of the beggars was now on the run (having betrayed his benefactor, sold out the Laughing Shadows, and run out on the Golden Scales.

Fariex says the Filth King came to him this morning, right after the Coalition Meeting broke up in rancor. Knowing of Fariex’s commercial interests the beggar king tried to sell him a very valuable set of armor. “Of course, I do not deal in pawnbrokerage, even with very valuable items,” Fariex said, “But I did direct him to a factor of mine, suggesting he might offer a good deal.”

Giving Maggie directions to a dealer in exotic armor, the copper dragon told her, “It occurred to me that such a set of Pouncing Drowmesh would be an excellent complement to your considerable skills.”

Not sure how Fariex might know about her leaping skills, Maggie thanked the dragon and asked him if she might be of assistance to him.

“Oh, I am sure the time will come,” Fariex replied as they returned to the inn.

There Maggie found Maxim explaining to the rest of the party what his plan for the tea party to which Telicanthus had invited them. It was all very complicated and involved distracting people and searching the mansion via Stealth. “I’m sure that’s a plan that will need some revisions once the battle has been joined,” Maggie thought.

Sure enough, the tour of the mansion offered small opportunity for distractions (but many opportunities to explore the mansion) and once the party itself was going, few distractions were needed.

But Stealth was at a premium. Maggie could see that Pennel, the butler who looked like an assassin to Maggie, was constantly watching everyone. Telicanthus was much more discreet about keeping an eye on people, but Maggie was convinced he was watching as well.

Valhalla had noticed the old adventurer grimacing in pain and rubbing his knee, so he went back to the ballroom and told Baranor the Black about using Elfstar, a flower which eases the suffering of older orcs whose joints cause them grief. In his gratitude, Baranor rambled on about his days as an adventurer, comparing Valhalla to his old cleric friend “Goldie.” Apparently he and Goldie had once survived the destruction of a city far to the south which was hit by an earthquake. The real information Baranor provided comes when he mentions the “earthquake” he felt a few nights back, and the few nights before that. He told Valhalla he’s complained to Lord Torrance, but neither Torrance nor anyone else has felt them. “Sometimes you can feel things when yer deaf no one else can feel, I thinks,” Baranor told Valhalla. “Back when I could hear, I ignored the first tremors of the quake in the south because I couldn’t hear anything. Goldie didn’t, though.” When Valhalla pressed him further he was able to figure out that the tremors seemed to come from behind Telicanthus’s mansion.

Sam the Foresworn saw Valhalla heading back to the large ballroom (“apparently intended for bigger parties than this,” he thought) but decided not to follow, “Baranor and Valalla seem suited to each other,” he suggested to Maggie.

Soon Maxim was executing his distraction plan. Apparently, the Hobgoblin felt that a ruckus in the Portrait Gallery would attract attention away from those attending who might have better sneaking skills. Peeking into the gallery, he saw Maxim talking loudly to General Taramin, who was casually examining Telicanthus’s family tree. Engaging in what seemed to Sam to be loud but meaningless small talk, Maxim learned that Genera Taramin was asked, as a personal favor, to leave his watch patrols away from the mansion, since their presence was “a distraction to Telicanthus’s work.”

Seeing at least one of the other guests distracted by Maxim, Sam returned to the Tea Room, where he saw Zumos spying on the archdean of the university, who was speaking to Telicanthus in an agitated conversation about food storage in the city.

“Well, Zumos’s insight should be sufficient to glean whatever can be gleaned from that.” Sure enough, later Zumos revealed that Telicanthus was surreptitiously looking around to see if anyone is paying attention to the conversation, and reassuring Archdean Grimaldi at the same time. The archdean concluded the exchange by looking pointedly at Telicanthus’s kitchen and stores before walking off, seemingly pacified.

Getting ready for his own excursion into the rooms of the mansion, Sam found Delis in the back hall, bouncing up and down on her feet without really jumping. The elf explained that she had noticed that, near the back of the house on the ground floor, the floor felt extra creaky, indicating something was happening near the foundation at that back portion of the property.

Zumos spotted Archdean Grimaldi in a conversation with Telicanthus. The Archdean was agitated and asking something about food storage in the city. He also noticed that Telicanthus was surreptitiously looking around to see if anyone was paying attention to the conversation, while reassuring the Archdean at the same time. The Archdean concluded the exchange by looking pointedly at Telicanthus’s kitchen and stores before walking off, seemingly pacified.

Maxim Shalion thought his plan was working out quite well. Nobody had done much searching of the mansion yet, but the distractions were flying hot and heavy. Magdalene was just beginning to work her diplomacy on Lord and Lady Torrance in the Tea Room.

She was reassuring the pair about the Golden Scales intention to keep their investigation quiet. Obviously successful in this, Lord Torrance seemed to Maxim to be assured of their capabilities. Lord Torrance gave a hint of a nod in the direction of Pennel, the butler who was openly staring Maggie down from across the room. When Lord Torrance saw Maggie notice Pennel, he gave a slight nod and moved away.

When Magdalene came up to Maxim later and suggested the butler’s rooms be search, Maxim agreed.

But it was Sam (of course who got to Pennel’s rooms first, searching the butler’s bedroom as well as a storeroom. Reporting nothing of interest in the storeroom, Sam was unable to get into the small lockbox he found in the bedroom. When he reported that failure to Maxim, Max knew just what he would do about it.

After Valahalla produced the key to Telicanthus’s office, Maxim sent Alen to get inside the box in Pennel’s room, the quasit demon ate the clothing he found inside and returned with his mouth covered in blood. He seemed to have enjoyed it.

While Pennel did not see the demon (or the blood on his lips) he did detect Maxim’s lips moving as he gave instructions to the demon telepathically. Zumos was spotted by Telicanthus trying to sneak down the hall as well.

Fresh off his success with Baranor the Black, Valhalla decided to attempt a little Thievery. Telicanthus’s butler had raised suspicions all around, so Valhalla decided to pick his pocket. Spotting Pennel (the butler who seemed strong enough to also act as a bodyguard) pocket the key to his office, he snagged the key out of Pennel’s pocket as he passed by on an errand.

Delis Erinthal knew she had find something before Telicanthus and his butler got any more suspicious, so she headed strait for Pennel’s office. It was easy to get in using the key that Valhalla had lifted off the butler.

Going through the papers there, she was able to tell that Telicanthus and his estate were going through a preposterous amount of money, but she was unable to figure out exactly where it was going. A more thoroughgoing search turned up the key to Telicanthus’s office which she passed on to Maggie.

Maggie headed off to Telicanthus’s office (trying the key in each door as she came to it), after Bluffing Pennel into thinking she was headed in a different direction. The door at the end of the hall was locked, but opened with this key.

The journal on the desk held nothing but guest lists for the parties Telicanthus was famous for throwing. Impressive lists, but nothing more. Delis did not find the secret of the room until she brought Sam and Maggie back there.

They noticed the room wasn’t wide enough, given the size of the master bedroom next door. Sam noticed that the full-length mirror was magical, but Maggie did not need that: Walking Through Shadows, she was able to teleport to the other side. Sam and Delis figured out that the touching the mirror with a pieced of stained glass caused it to allow passage for those without teleportation powers.

Once behind the wall, they found a set of stairs leading down into the undercity. Deciding they should get back to the tea party before Maxim’s distractions wore out, the trio returned and asked General Taramin if he knew about the excavations beneath the mansion. The general told them such excavations had been common in the early days of Sayre, but that they were strictly prohibited because they had caused many cave-ins and much loss of life.

The Golden Scales decided they would have to return later to find out why Telicanthus was so interested in the ruin of Augur beneath Sayre.

And Ends Up Still Being Called "The Coalition"

Although Amyria’s Two Most Important Goals Were Achieved

Sam the Foresworn listened intently as Amyria explained her goals for the Coalition meeting. “I have convinced them to consider all these proposals. It’s OK if you want to bring up additional items, but these are those they have agreed to put on their agenda.”

Each member of the Coalition will transfer control of all military units under their command to the Coalition Council;

We will choose a leader for the coalition based on a vote of all members of the Council;

A vote will determine what the Council believes is the importance of Amyria’s dream and whether it warrants investigation.;

The Coalition will choose a name which is more evocative than the simple name, “The Coalition”; and

The Coalition will agree to investigate Telicanthus and to find the Githyanki communication hub.

“This last one is of the highest importance, although it may encounter some resistance from Lord Torrance. He has become something of a champion of Telicanthus in Sayre society and it may be embarrassing for him should the Githyanki turn out to be a fraud.”

Sam couldn’t help but agree with the Deva’s assessment, although he put an almost equal importance on the military control issue. Once they got to the meeting hall and Amyria introduced them to the Council, Sam saw that the dwarven paladin named Kalad (who was representing Overlook) agreed with him on the importance of a unified command.

Amyria had told them just before they got to the hall that Kalad already supported her on all five points. “Unfortunately for us,” Amyria admitted, “he won’t be much use in convincing the rest. They appear to discounting much of what he says as a kind of personal devotion to me.”

Didn’t take long before Sam noticed that dynamic at work.

But he was impressed at the way Maggie confronted Lord Torrance about transferring control of his military units to the coalition. “May not convince Torrance himself,” the hobbit thought to himself, “but it looks like Odos and Caliandra are listening closely.”

Seeing and opening with Odos, Sam brought up the Githzerai history with the Githyanki to convince Odos about control of military units. “I believe that history shows clearly the advantage of working together,” he offered, pleased to see the blind monk nodding sagely. Sam also noticed Garen nodding from across the table.

Kalad was glad he apologized to Amyria, but he wished he hadn’t broken down during the apology. As he rode back to Overlook, he told himself, “They proved that I’m right. Without a leader, they’re a headless, bickering bunch. At least, I can still see to the defense of the Vale.” He knew the leaders of the dwarven city would listen to his calls for unity. “With the exception of one clan.”

Garen Bladerun nodded as he saw Fariex and Quelenna were already leaning towards a unified military command. Amyria had explained before the meeting that Fariex would have few objections, since no one knew of any troops the businessman might command. Garen thought back to who Amyria had said would be attending:

Most Exalted Odos of the House of Reprisal — Garen already knew him from their battles against the Githyanki at Akma’ad;

Lord Divian Torrance — the ruler of Sayre, elected by a fellowship of scholars and merchants;

Quelenna Entromiel — female Eladrin, who rules over the mercantile settlement of Dornaithose;

Inogo Dravitch — a priest of Erathis, who traveled a long way to get here from the temple city of Sherrbyr, where Erathis’s followers have ruled over a theocracy for centuries;

Kalad — a dwarven paladin who is here representing Overlook, apparently a long-time friend of Sam and Jerath;

Caliandra of the Stagrunners — whose influence apparently extends beyond her own Stagrunner Tribe as she was recently named Voice of 25 tribes of Elven barbarians who live to the north and the west of Elsir Vale; and

Fariex the Scalehammer — although Amyria said he would be attending “in human form,” it didn’t take Garen long to figure out he was dealing with an adult Copper Dragon (although this puzzled him, as most Copper Dragons did not have the power to adopt such forms).

Garen turned his Insight from the metallic dragon to Lord Torrance’s concerns about military control. He could see the ruler’s uneasiness was shared by many at the table, so Garen decided to change the subject to another of the agenda items, one that would not bring up so much conflict.

This effort was forestalled when Kalad banged his fist noisily on the table and called for a vote on transferring control. Fortunately, it passed: As Garen had expected, only Lord Torrance and Inogo held out with nay votes.

“Probably make it harder to convince Lord Torrance on the other issues,” Garen mused.

When Maggie brought up the communication devices, Garen was impressed that Grigore showed one to Lord Torrance, changing the subject much more deftly than Garen could have managed. Maggie suggested her research indicated the glasswork might have come from Telicanthus and even the ruler of Sayre, where Telicanthus was quite popular, had to admit it warranted investigation.

Out of nowhere, Valhalla proposed a name for the Coalition: Dragonfang. Garen could tell Amyria liked the name, which she readily admitted. She said she was thinking of another dragon-themed name: Heaven’s Fang. Sensing from Caliandra’s reaction that she might be more amenable to a nature oriented name, Grigore suggested a third: Wolf Pack Brotherhood.

Garen was partial to the draconic names himself, but he saw that Grigore had swayed Caliandra’s vote.

Caliandra could not believe the “Coalition” could not even agree to so simple a task as coming up with a name. Amyria seemed favor the suggestion of the half-orc, and Caliandra liked the ardent’s offering. But they weren’t insisting their ideas be accepted. Any name would do. The debate showed the Coalition would never reach consensus. “Easier to convince 25 tribes of free-spirited elves to work together than to get that group to accomplish the simplest of jobs,” she said to herself as she headed towards the wilds of the badlands on the far side of Borodin’s Watch.

Maxim Shalion pulled himself from the table and started to pace while recounting the history of Nachtur to try and convince Inogo the high priest of a town to the north of Sayre to vote for an investigation of Telicanthus.

“It is common knowledge that understanding one’s enemy leads to the victory for one’s people. Less than 20 years ago Nachtur cam under attack by large groups of kobolds and green dragonborn. investigating this we discovered a hobgoblin in the court of the very city the Great Gark ruled from had aligned himself with a green dragon. We managed to stop the dragon however.” Maxim finished before retaking his seat.

“The Great Gark?” Inogo snorted, and Maxim could see that others at the table were similarly biased against the goblin king. “Caliandra and Quelenna, in particular,” he thought to himself

Magdalene took a more diplomatic approach and convinced Fariex to support the idea that the Coalition should adopt a more significant name. Then she watched as Maxim attempted an elaborate bluff to get Inogo involved in the vote on the investigation of Telicanthus, but the old priest was not fooled.

Maggie’s bluff on Fariex was more successful, winning his vote on the Telecanthus investigation. She couldn’t tell if the crafty trader was fooled or whether he was simply entertained by the effort. Seemed like that kind of guy…

…or that kind of dragon. Whatever. Maggie saw Garen casually flipping a copper coin. “Casual” not being the best card in the dragonborn’s deck, Magdalene was convinced that no one who had not already noticed Fariex was a dragon would figure the clue.

Delis Erinthal was glad when Garen’s diplomacy on the Telicanthus investigation succeeded and Kalad immediately called for a vote. Odos joined Kalad to vote yea with Fariex, Torrance and Quelenna.

Inogo and the traditional naysayer were the only no votes. Delis began to think the old elf would only support an idea if she herself came up with it. “Of course,” Delis thought wryly, “once she criticizes someone else’s idea, she just may bring it up again a few minutes later. Thinking it is her own and perfectly willing to declare it sound once it has been pronounced by her own mouth.”

Delis tried to convince Lord Torrance he should offer his interpretation of the dream but he shook the suggestion off as too arcane. Maggie immediately jumped in and asked Odos for his religious perspective on Amyria’s dream. Delis suspected Magdalene was exaggerating her own knowledge of religion, but Odos humored her and offered up some insights.

Sam tried to gain some insight into Odos’s reasons for accepting the investigation of the dream, but misinterpreted the clues and the meeting blew up with Kalad storming out. Before he left, the paladin offered a tearful apology to Amyria, insisting he would come back when the Council “pulled its heads out of the sand.”

Caliandra also pulled out of the Council, suggesting that diplomacy among barbarians was easier than convincing the Coalition to do something as simple as adopting a name.

As they traipsed back to the River Jewel, Delis was struck by the contrast: Kalad and Caliandra were furious; Fariex seemed complaisant; and The Golden Scales were all depressed.

But Amyria was exultant.

Then Delis realized what had happened. Amyria had accomplished both of the goals she had placed the most weight upon. None of the Council members (except Kalad, who was already there) had come over to Amyria’s “side,” but perhaps that was not what was important to the Deva.

She had even got Lord Torrance to agree to the investigation of Telicanthus. Delis suspected the old politician had agreed only to make sure he could put his limits on the inquiry. But the Council had put its stamp of approval on it, despite Torrance’s misgivings.

Grigore Finally Gets a Good Night's Rest...

…And Oversleeps.

Garen Bladerun was no longer able to Lay On Hands. He had called on Bahamut one too many times this night. Every time he tried it, his hands shook and his faith failed. He was really looking forward to a brief rest.

And looking forward to a long sleep even more.

When he saw Maxim reaching for the treasure, he screamed, “Noooo!” Surely a pile of coins that large — and donated to a dark goddess like Tiamat — was cursed.

The shout did nothing to stop the Hobgoblin. Who was soon unconscious. As soon as his red hand touched the first coin, all of the treasure began sliding and shifting. In a frightening short period of time, it formed itself in to a gigantic Treasure Golem.

Which looked remarkably like a Gold Dragon. And easily batted Maxim into unconsciousness.

“This cannot be tolerated!” Garen screamed. That Tiamat’s treasure would form itself to look like an ally of Bahamut was a blasphemy that could not stand. As he prepared to charge, the golem obliged by lumbering across the pit and Garen noticed the Filth King was even more aghast than he.

He could tell the king of the beggars was concerned about a different kind of blasphemy: He was perfectly willing to betray the shrouded agent who had hired him — the guy in the cloak had hardly warned heroes of this mettle would be coming after him and the Laughing Shadows.

But betraying the Queen of Treachery? Stealing the offerings put before Her statue?

Garen could see that the king was really worried. Worried enough to attack even before Garen could charge. The Filth King cast some strange illusion that made it look like the Coin Golem had left some treasure behind. The golem rushed back across the pit.

Delis moved into position and fired some quick shots into the golem. But that position left the Unselie Agent vulnerable to the golem’s next attack. After it crossed back over the pit, it showed how much it could do with its Gleamshards. Bouncing them off the walls it was able to slide its enemies closer. And attacking straight ahead it could knock almost anyone prone.

And then it exploded.

Clarity. It all made sense to Grigore now. Carl Johan Goldforge, his uncle had always been a beacon of calm, mature clarity in young Grigore’s life. Not just the wild adventurer his mother had always seen, but a calm presence in the midst of chaos. Maybe the halberd had been the key to that calm. He felt somehow more mature as he turned to the old man muttering to himself in the rocking chair. “I should never have listened,” the old man said when Grigore finally convinced him to talk more loudly. “My fiance was as beautiful as sunset over the sea. I had everything I wanted, until that other woman convinced me to leave my love. I tried so hard to resist, but how can you escape the one you’ve dreamed of all your life? I told Bethany before the wedding that I had met the girl I had always dreamed of.” Although the old man was not really talking to Grigore, his words were clearer now. “We argued. I told Bethany to leave, and to throw her ring into the river. She stole my carriage and fled north. I never saw her again. I never saw the other woman again, either. I drank my sorrows away till my health failed. Been here almost 40 years now — 40 lonely years.” With this Ring

The strange golem split into its component treasures which exploded into several members of the Golden Scales before diffusing into a swirling mass of glitter. She could see the cloud of treasure was sufficiently insubstantial that Sam and Garen were having difficulty doing much damage to it.

Sam had been worrying that the golem might be healing the earlier wounds that Delis had inflicted, but Delis could tell her arrows would do even less. So she took the opportunity to get out of the range of the golem’s swirl.

Just in time to see Grigore materialize. As if out of nowhere.

Grigore hurried to The Sword’s Point. He knew his uncle’s friends were there. They had sent him to rescue Dern, who had warned them about some alchemist named Taergan. Dern was convinced that Taergan was trying to lure his old friends — a dwarf and a thief — into the Verduran Forest. But the innkeeper told him they were gone. “Bought horses and lit out fast,” he said. But it took some cajoling from Grigore before the innkeeper remembered they told him to let the ardent into their rooms. “You really an ardent?” the innkeeper asked. In the room, Grigore found 11 magickal arrows, which convinced him Igneus and Branda were not aware of the trap they were walking into. They also left a scroll and a note: “Grigore: We received word Taergan is being held against his will in the Verduran Forest north of here. We have set out to find him at a place called Tristeza House. Please bring what you need and meet us as soon as you can. Bring word of Dern’s safety with you. — Branda Tulles.” Finding the Path

Magdalene had seen Grigore use his Wormhole Plunge to great effect before. “But it is an awfully powerful spell to use to get past a couple of minions,” she thought to herself.

Grigore didn’t seem to be worrying too much about using his powers. He went straight to work healing those who needed it.

“No shortage of those,” Maggie mused, as the golem reformed itself out of the swarm and demonstrated it could do it all over again.

The Filth King had gone down in the initial explosiion, and Maggie saw Sam rush over and try to heal him.

As Grigore emerged from The Sword’s Point, he noticed a crowd beginning to form. People were beginning to hear about the haunts he was putting to rest and good he had done in Hope’s Hollow. Even the Governor was there. “People have been talking about what you’re doing here in the city — slaying ghosts and rescuing people. We need more folks like you. In fact, we have a few of Casomir’s finest missing in the woods up north. When you’re finished with the work you’re doing now, I’d like you to go after a band of rangers we sent north to scout the forest. The druids are concerned for them, which worries us. And, of course, good people going missing isn’t something we can let stand.” Grigore got the governor to direct him to Brother Zaganos who gave him two more quests: Child of the Wildwood and Finding Strange Beasts. Then Grigore realized he was still in a dream and woke up. To find he was late. He had to use Delis’s Map to catch up with the rest of the Golden Scales.

Sam the Foresworn could tell the Filth King was well and truly dead as soon as he tried to stabilize the ragged beggar. “I hope we got all the information we could out of him before he died,” he told Grigore as he explained that healing spells would be wasted on the body unless they performed a Raise Dead ritual first.

Sam turned to the golem and soon figured out that his backstabs did, indeed, do a lot of damage.

“As long as I don’t try them when he’s insubstantial.”

When the battle was over and the Coin Golem was dead, Sam was as surprised as anyone that the body of the Filth King was no longer there. Grigore accused him of letting the beggar get away with playing possum, Sam insisted he was sure the guy was dead. “Maybe his henchmen slipped in and made off with the body,” he thought to himself, even though he saw no evidence that anyone had sneaked past him.

“But, at last, we have a treasure worthy of my skills,” Sam announced as they divided up the enormous pile and Delis claimed the Eyes of the Eagle, apparently a trinket she had been searching for.

Sam could hardly see the lenses once Delis rested them on her eyes, but the elf insisted they improved her vision, especially at a distance.

Maxim Takes it to the Limit...

…One More Time

Chance Runner awoke to find himself alone in the room at the posh hotel where Telicanthus had set them up. The River Jewel or some such.

“I guess they went on ahead without me,” he thought. “I’d better hurry and catch up.”

Luckily, he had paid attention earlier when Delis had explained how to get into the secret lair of the beggars. Beneath the city in Riverdown as he recalled. Just the other side of the Low Bridge to the University district.

He headed down that way, gave a gold piece to a very happy beggar kid named Whoolayo and found the first trap door propped open. He dropped another coin into the slot by the second trap door and made his way down to the lower level — supposedly part of an ancient city, buried beneath Sayre.

“Hmmm, I thought Delis said there was a Gluttonous Cube here,” he said. “I guess that explains all the acid on the floor. I wonder who set off the ambush.”

Once he got through the door he found the rest of the Golden Scales preparing to raid a temple. Chance could tell it was once dedicated to Ioun, but the symbols of that Goddess had all been stripped away. Inside the vestibule, it became apparent the temple had been re-dedicated to Tiamat. Which seemed to enrage Maxim for some reason.

The pews inside were filled with beggars, all facing Garen who volunteered to go through the door first. A filthy and bedraggled priest across the room stood before the altar. “Get them!” he hissed.

The Filth King was just starting his sermon when Whoolayo rang the bell. He sent some of the Laughing Shadows to set up the ambush with the Gluttonous Cube. “Don’t forget to pull all the planks off the upper floors,” he reminded them.

The battle was already joined by the time Valhalla roused himself from bed and made his way to the temple.

“I better start handing out the slaying,” the half-orc decided as he concentrated on the Beggar King. Maggie had already laid down some serious damage on the raggedy priest, but some groveling no-account was convincing the fake beggars (the ones with chainmail under their rags) to mark the other members of the party.

He had never fully realized the value of his executioner’s axe before, but it was clearly the perfect weapon for a slayer like himself. It didn’t take long before the Filth King was bloodied and looking to switch sides.

“Your boss doesn’t pay me enough for this,” the priest told the groveler and he started to attack the false beggars.

“Your boss doesn’t pay me enough for this!” the king of the beggars snarled at the Laughing Shadows. The intruders were targeting him before he switched sides, but they quickly decided the Groveler was the real boss. They quickly finished off the Shadows, making the Beggar King especially glad he had switched to the winning side. “At least I still have my insurance policy,” he thought to himself.

Magdalene made sure the Filth King did not sneak off when the battle was over. She wanted to know more about whoever it was who wasn’t paying him enough.

The king of the beggars readily identified the guys in chainmail as Laughing Shadows, a band of mercenaries. He swore he did not have enough money to hire them himself.

“A few weeks back, I was approached by a stranger in a cloak. I did not see his face, but he offered to pay substantially if my beggars would harass the Githzerai at every opportunity. Now I knew no Gith would be easy marks and I told him so.”

Maggie could see the problem and told him so.

“That’s when he offered me the services of some mercenaries he had in his employ. Turned out to be these Laughing Shadows guys. But they did not protect me as well as I expected. But they did allow me to collect some of the bounties he offered.”

Maggie assumed this meant the bounties on the Githzerai. And it sounded like the Filth King was telling the truth.

“Yeah, he was not just willing to pay for harassment. He actually paid us a bounty for dead Githzerai. Even when it was his own men doing most of the killing.”

Just then, Maxim jumped to the other side of a pit which protected a pile of treasure beneath a statue of Tiamat. When the treasure turned into a golem — shaped like a dragon — Maggie knew they were in trouble.

“Not even time for a short rest,” she thought as the Treasure Golem reared up over Maxim.

After the fight, the ninja girl started interrogating him. He told her all he knew, even though she seemed more gullible than the rest of the intruders. When he saw the hobgoblin messing with the pile of tribute, he shouted, “Don’t touch the tribute. You don’t want to try to betray the Queen of Treachery!” But the hobgoblin went ahead and grabbed for the gold. King Filth watched in horror as the mound of treasure began to shift of its own accord.

“Where are you guys?” asked Grigore Goldforge as he found himself once again on the lawn outside the Mother’s Care Home for Invalids. The old man in in the wheelchair was still there, but he saw no sign of the rest of the Golden Scales.

“Oh, yeah,” he realized that this was a new dream. He was once again his uncle. The rest of the Golden Scales were lost in their own dreams. Jerath had given them a quick rest this time, not a rest together. For the rest together did not refresh.

“I guess in order to ‘knit the raveled sleeve of care’ I have to face a dream alone,” he said — a little embarrassed he was quoting Jerath. And he turned to talk to the old man and see what he said about his fiance.

As he turned, he realized he was now wearing the scimitar which Garen had found in a previous dream. He thought remembered Garen Bladerun calling it “Clarity.”

“That’s crazy,” he said to himself as he drew the blade. “In this dream, I am my uncle. And he would never carry a scimitar.”

But he felt a calm presence as he pulled it from its sheath, almost as if Clarity was a living being of extreme empathy.

Trying to reassure him.

He remembered his uncle telling him that he always believed his halberd was sentient, just unable to to speak, communicating only through an empathetic connection with him which grew stronger the more bravely he fought against evil.

“That’s what he called it!” he said, startling the old man in the wheelchair. “Clarity. My uncle called his halberd ‘Clarity’!”

As he looked down at the scimitar in amazement, he realized it was no longer a scimitar, but a polearm. His uncle’s halberd.

WWABD (What Would a Beggar Do?)

Give and you shall be given to

Delis Erinthal carefully pointed out the beggar-child after she told the rest of them about the warehouse and sign — Give and you shall be given to.

She was convinced this kid (or another like him) was always posted outside the abandoned warehouse. Delis was explaining this as the boy wandered over and asked for coins. She promptly gave the beggar a copper piece.

Maxim followed suit, but Sam and Garen refused. The beggar looked a little confused, but wandered away.

A little irked at the failure to understand her suggestions, Delis walked over to the boarded-up doorway. “Ridolfi and Sons, Spice Merchants,” the faded sign over it said. Telling herself to be more careful the next time she gave instructions to the other Golden Scales, Delis undid the latch which allowed the boards to swing out with the door.

Inside it was dark. The light which had filtered in during the day was no longer there. Soon, her eyes were glowing and her darkvision was fully active. The Unselie agent made her way easily over to the trap door. It was trapped. She had forgotten that from her earlier visit. Delis decided to wait.

Once Maxim was inside, she saw that waiting was a good idea. With no darkvision power, Maxim was having difficulty seeing the path through the debris. He was trying to feel his way, but not making good progress. As Delis made her way over to help him, she decided to wait there until everyone was inside. Then Sam could disarm the trapped trap door.

Garen came through next and then Sam arrived, breathless. “I think we’ve been spotted!” the hobbit said. “The alarm has been sounded. I think we should expect trouble.”

Whoolayo saw the four dressed in rags before they saw him. Beggars, surely, but no one he recognized. These were the kind of people he was supposed to check out: Probably Covet House material, but not necessarily cleared to enter yet.

Cursing the narrow passageway they found themselves in, Garen Bladerun, was crawling on his hands and knees. As were the rest of them, except the halfling. After Sam had removed the trap on the trap door, he had gone down and pronounced the passage under the warehouse to be “fine.”

“Fine for a halfling, maybe,” thought Garen. But he was pretty sure it was too small for him to unfurl his wings and fly. At the end of the passage, they found another trap door, leading further down.

He recognized this trap door as the one Delis had told them about. A crudely carved sign said, “Give and you shall be given to.” Delis said it could be opened easily by slipping a coin into the slot next to it.

When they opened it, they quickly spotted the ambush that had been set there. Delis told them she got past the Gluttonous Cube here with no problem, but she did not mention anything about an ambush. As they sat there in line before the trap door, debating tactics, shurikens began flying out of the opening. So the others began leaping in.

When his turn came, Garen decided to unfurl his wings. What better venue for gliding wings than a three-story drop into the undercity. Delis had blocked the opening with one of her globes of darkness, but he was pretty sure he could get past that before he hit the floor three stories down.

Sure enough, when he got past the region of darkness, he was able to see a groundfloor lurker who could be pinned against the wall. Unable to maintain his hover and fly away without a reposte from the Streetfighter (obviously one of the gang who were posing as beggars by wearing rags over their chainmail). So he dropped to the floor and pinned the fighter against the wall.

The cube had retreated to block the door which seemed the only way out. But, as soon as it saw him on its level, it slammed into him and immobilized him. The Streetfighter’s follow-up might have slowed him, but being immobilized was all the paladin could manage at one time.

Once he was mobile again, the cube tried another slam that the cube began to vibrate badly. Obviously frustrated by this failure, the cube kept on trying. But all it got for its efforts was a shaking so violent it split itself in two. While this made each cube easier to kill, the resulting blobs were able to gang up on him.

First one would immobilize him, then the other would engulf him. He spent much of the rest of the battle fighting his way out from inside ever-diminished cubelets.

Whoolayo walked over to the small group of beggars and asked them for a coin. That was the secret. Give and you shall be given to. If these beggars had already been recruited, they would know about the passcoin. The elf-woman quickly gave him a coin and so did the hobgoblin. But the halfling kept his money, and so did the dragon-guy. Strange, maybe the others don’t trust them yet.

Maxim Shalion was in the perfect position: The floors had long since rotted out of this three-story buried building, but the remnants of the floors (basically boards sticking out of the walls every 10 feet or so), offered the perfect perch for a ranged attacker like himself or Delis.

Even Sam did some ranged fighting before leaping to the “ground” level to help Garen battle the cubes. But Maxim could fight just fine from up on the ledges. And he had the perfect spell to be-devil the cubes. When he placed a Hunger of Hadar in the middle of the bottom story, the cubes could not fit in the space around the edges without leaving some portion of their blobbiness. inside the globe of darkness, hungry shadows were constantly nibbling at their very life energies.

Even once the cubes were whittled down — or divided down (one of them split in two when one of his Eldritch Blasts did some major curse damage on it) — far enough to fit on the edges, they could still be forced into the globe of shadowy knives. Engulfing the engulfers, what better way to fight fire with fire? Sure he could only use this spell once a day, but Maxim knew he was unlikely to have a more perfect place to use it.

Garen seemed to dislike being engulfed so often, but Delis kept telling him he was doing his job by keeping them busy. Maxim guessed that he paladin just did like having acidic goop all over his shiny armor.

Whoolayo decided he better keep a close eye on the beggars. The elf went over to the warehouse and walked inside, acting every bit like she knew what she was doing. The hobgoblin likewise showed that he knew what the Covet House protocols were all about. Whoolayo lost track of the hobbit. But when the dragonborn went to the “Ridolfi and Sons” and through the boarded up doorway. The lookout decided this was the kind of thing he was supposed be on the lookout for: suspicious intruders. Maybe the dragonborn was legit, but that was not Whoolayo’s call to make. The young beggar quickly made his way over to a rope hidden by the foundation of a nearby building and gave it three quick pulls. If the dragon man was a new recruit, he could explain it to the welcoming committee…. Whoolayo chuckled, “From the inside of a gluttonous cube.”

Sam the Foresworn was able to help Garen with his Gluttonous Cube problem, once all the Streetfighters were finished off. Even with both Delis and Maggie working on the Scrabblers, the minions lasted much longer than Sam would have preferred.

Before the battle was over, even Sam was able to enjoy the view from inside of a cube, but he was finally able finish off the last cube.

Which was engulfing Garen in a last-ditch effort.

“How do you carve a statue of a dragonborn paladin?” asked the hobbit, flourishing the dagger he just bought. “You just cut off everything that doesn’t look like Garen.”

A fruitless search for loot later, Sam came up with another riddle: How do find the pockets on a Gluttonous Cube of semi-gelled acid?

When it came time to explore the rest of the Covet House underground complex, he volunteered. He found a partially-dug-out street, complete with palettes and sleeping gear for the beggars who made their home down here. But the street was obviously a remnant of the city of Augur, which had apparently been buried here in ages past.

Sam had heard from some of the historian in the party that was some kind of punishment for wizardly wrongdoings, but what else can you expect from wizards? “Sooner or later, they get too powerful for their own good.”

He also found an abandoned building from the ancient city, but no own had ever bothered to clear it out.

Across the “street,” however, was a temple which had obviously been restored. The original decorations (maybe commemorating Ioun or some such god) had been torn down, but not replaced.

Sam decided it was time to return to the others and tell them what he had found.

This time with real daemons...

…even if they’re only in someone’s head.

Maxim Shalion was the first to notice it: Not everybody seemed to have the same idea as to who the enemy was.

Mind-control and doppelgangers. Keeping track of who was who not longer seemed totally possible inside Grigore’s dream.

Maxim figured out a simple rule: If it attacked the demons, it must be a friend; if it attacked a friend, it was suspect and its advice could safely be ignored.

pan·de·mo·ni·um wild uproar or unrestrained disorder
“This time it was the daemons’ goal: create confusion and disorder.”
— Ambassador TIen

Valhalla was really in his element. Not only could he hack and slash with his axe inside this dream, but he could let his mind run free as he debated the existential meaning of identity within a dream with Magdalene.

Let the daemons figure out his deepest desires and use them to trick him into attacking the others. He saw it happen to Sam. He saw it happen to Maxim.

They were in a dream. His favorite dream. A dream of slaying where a friend could turn and attack at any moment.

Perfect place for an executioner’s axe. And Valhalla had the best.

pan·de·mo·ni·um tumult or chaos
“Yeah. Can’t blame it on the Golden Scales this time. The daemons were trying for utter chaos. This time it was the daemons. In his head.”
— Alen the Quasit

Chance Runner was pretty sure letting the Dark Slayers suck the life out of the patients in this nursing home was a bad idea as soon as Delis suggested it. And his book confirmed it: As soon they had sucked the last life out of a victim, these demons would become more powerful.

That was the way Delis seemed to think. Chance figured that was why she became an archer. But Valhalla and Maxim seemed to have other ideas. They were dealing damage at a ferocious rate. And Sam and Maggie were living up to their usual standards.

Thinking that his best powers could not be used up in someone else’s dream, Chance turned himself into a spark and tried to match the damage the others were laying down.

When the fight was over and all the Dark Slayers dead, Grigore led the Golden Scales to a room where an elderly cleric lay. Chance could tell that Grigore already knew where this room was. He even seemed to know who the priest was. And he wanted to get him to speak.

But the man on the bed was unable to talk until Maggie identified the Indigo Dreams poison the Dark Slayers had been administering to him in the guise of nursing-home administrators. Once identified, Grigore was able to heal the cleric enough that he could speak.

The cleric sputtered for a few seconds, working his dry mouth and choking out a rasping cough.

“There’s no time,” he said in a hoarse whisper. “Taergan Flinn keeps me here. He plans to murder Crandel and Tulles. Don’t let them go into the woods. Fiends and nightmares lurk there.”

pan·de·mo·ni·um a place or scene of riotous uproar or utter chaos
“All inside his head. Dreams. That guy’s got some weird stuff going on in there.”
— Ambassador Tien

The elderly priest then began to struggle visibly, as if forcing memories to the surface of his mind. His eyes widened momentarily.

“A house in the Hollow.” Grigore Goldforge was sure that his uncle’s friend was referring to the town of Hope’s Hollow. “My strong box. My old treasures, and my piece of the watch. Take them to Tulles. She will know you speak for me.” He breathed heavily for a few seconds, struggling find strength in his weakened body, then continued:

“Find Flinn. Make him confess. And tell the town about this place so these families can save their own.”

Dern Fosimuth closed his eyes, exhausted by the effort. His breathing slowed, but Grigore could tell that it was even.

After the Golden Scales told the townspeople about the evil that Taergan Flinn had arranged in the Mother’s Care Home for Invalids, they explained where Dern’s house could be found.

In the strong box, they found a talking scimitar which took an immediate liking to Garen, whose name seemed to be Garen Deve in the dream. Or maybe Ged. Grigore wasn’t sure. They also found scroll of consecrate. Dern’s fragment of the Weirding Watch was found, mounted on a copper bracelet.

Grigore awoke, surrounded by those who had participated in the ritual with him. He had one thing on his mind: What were the names of the people he was supposed warn?

It was a question which had haunted him in the dream, even before he woke up. But it was not the question Jerath asked him.

“You wanted me do do another ritual?” the bard wanted to know. “Was that the Song of Restfulness?”

A small town in the Shadowfell...

…where Grigore’s family…

…would visit when he was a child. Later his mother set her hopes on the idea that he would settle down there as a healer and cleric.

But, no…

…he had not go out and try to become some hotshot adventurer, like his uncle: his dead uncle.

It was a dark and stormy night. A vague and inchoate idea strikes down the weak.
— Chance Runner

Once he had helped some of his teammates to divvy up the loot and make a few purchases, Grigore Goldforge decided to concentrate on getting some ritual books for Rinoa. The sorceress had recently begun to see her ritual studies pay off, but she was definitely short of rituals she knew well enough to perform. Since they were in a town renowned for its magickal markets and flush with cash, the ardent decided now would be a good time to pick us some rituals.

University District near where they were staying seemed a logical place to shop. Sure enough, they found a street which seemed to be dedicated to selling scrolls and rituals. Grigore wasn’t sure why competitors would all set up shop in such close proximity to those they were competing against, but it seemed to be the rule in many cities, even in the Shadowfell.

It certainly made it easier to shop.

They soon found three shops which piqued their interest:

The Demon’s Binding, which seemed to use a bound demon for advertising (or maybe it was a “sign”) as well as for security;

Nature’s Way, which specialized in rituals connected with nature, and was run by (of all people) a half-orc priest; and

unNatural Rites, which turned out to be another nature specialist, despite the assumptions of necromancy which the party started out with.

But it was from a professor at the university they bought most of their rituals for Rinoa. Although they later learned he had shop called The Heart of the Matter they found him at his office.

A psychic vampire, another vague and inchoate idea that strikes down the weak.
— Sam the Foresworn

Garen was concerned about Grigore. The leader of the Golden Scales was sleeping only fitfully the past few nights. Some he seemed to get some rest; others were so dream-wracked that Grigore actually seemed less rested in the morning than when he had collapsed into his bedroll.

Garen doubted that even the posh accommodations at the River Jewel would break the cycle of bad dreams. Then he had an idea: ritual healing.

When he came back from the dead, Raven told him it was like waking from a good night’s sleep. The shaman said he felt completely refreshed. He took the proposal to Grigore.

“You want to kill me so you can resurrect me?” the healer exploded. "I’m not willing to undergo death just so I can feel rested.

But Garen was undetered. If Grigore was dead, he couldn’t very well complain that they were using a ritual to return him to life. And Garen was convinced that, if they kept fighting with Grigore this tired, sooner or later someone was going to have to resurrect him.

Jerath had a ritual book. Perhaps he could teach the resurrect ritual to Rinoa and she could use it on Grigore…

…should Grigore happen to die.

So, Garen went back to the River Jewel and found Jerath, who gladly loaned the paladin his ritual book.

Garen was disappointed to find this book was mostly bardic rituals, to be performed at taverns and misty camps in the hope that they might turn up some useful information or prepare a cast for a particularly difficult performance.

No Resurrection rituals. No back-from-the-dead rituals. Not even re-incarnation.

Song of Restfulness sounded promising, but when he took the idea to Grigore the ardent shot down the idea. “It doesn’t say you don’t dream,” he pointed out. “But we could use this tonight to get a good rest and still have time to hit the Covet House in the middle of the night. That might get us the advantage of surprise.”

As Garen and Grigore continued to peruse the book, they found several other useful rituals: Apparently Jerath did a lot of historical research for his plays; he seemed to favor rituals which would help him glean interesting facts, like Chorus of Truth, Aria of Revelation, History Revealed, Consult Mystic Sages, and Spirit Idol.

Then it hit him.

Garen found a ritual called Dream Concordance. Not what he was looking for, but it might be just the thing to help his friend.

If he was reading this right, the Dream Concordance allowed other people to enter Grigore’s bad dreams. And help him. Help him defeat whatever it was that was sapping his energies there.

As Jerath began his ritual, he asked them all to concentrate on what they wanted find in the dream. At first Sam could not imagine what he should look for. Then he had a sudden inspiration. What was pursuing Grigore in his dreams? Almost a mental version of the thing which the ardent feared most.

A psychic vampire.

So that was what Sam concentrated on: A vampire which preyed upon the fears and desires of those around it. He wasn’t sure what that meant, but he wanted to hunt it down in Grigore’s dream. Then he found himself in that very dream. On a dark and stormy night, the Golden Scales were all there, including Jerath, on a winding road. Up ahead, a graffitied signpost pointed the way to Hope’s Hollow.

The small town was laid out before them in regular squares as they looked down into the valley where it lay. To Sam it almost seemed like a chessboard. Grigore led them to a nursing home: “Mother’s Care Home for Invalids” reads the sign outside, but the Golden Scales ignored the pleading of a woman outside and entered anyway.

Inside, they followed Grigore to a room where bloodstains transformed into a strange haunt which admitted to patricide. “I fell in love with a beautiful woman, but she was betrothed to another. She said that unless I could repay the dowry given by her suitor, we could never be together. I asked my father for the money, but he said it would deplete my inheritance. Then I got really angry. He said, ‘Why don’t you just kill me then?’ I don’t know what came over me. All I could think about was my love. She was perfect for me — everything I ever dreamed about, and almost more perfect than I could bear.”

“Welcome to my nightmare,” Grigore told them then. “I think you’re gonna like it,” he said with a trace of irony. Garen stabbed and burned the bloody bedclothes. Then the whole group returned to the entry and social hall so they could explore the main office.

In that office, they found two middle-aged administrators, a man and a woman.

The man stood, looking down his nose at the adventurers, and said nothing.

Ar’jun, the grandmaster who trained me, who would never strike down the weak.
— Duilin Silverfang

...Another Round...

…with Tein and Alen still denying any involvement.

Everything seemed to be going fine: The paladin had revived one of their attackers, and Grigore had asked Maxim to help him with the interrogation. Maxim was going to play the “good cop” in what Grigore called a good-cop-bad-cop system, which he gathered was something like the good-drow-bad-goblin routine sometimes employed where he came from. Standard torturer’s tactics in the Great Gark’s dungeons.

He started with his bad-goblin routine, and Grigore took over with the good-cop stuff. When Grigore’s stuff got a little weak, it looked like a good time to alternate back into the bad-goblin part. So Maxim started to threaten some serious mayhem, like feeding the gangster’s brains to his demons or something like that.

At first, he thought Grigore was playing along with the script: The good-drow was supposed to pretend he was having trouble restraining the bad-goblin. But when Grigore told him not to interfere, it was the ardent who seemed to be losing control. Maybe the good-cop-bad-cop routine was different, but in the good-drow-bad-goblin technique it was the bad goblin who was supposed to seem out of control.

First, Grigore hit him. Didn’t hurt much and Maxim guessed it could be taken as a crude form of restraint. But, when Maxim tried to continue the charade, Grigore ordered Garen to punch him. Instead of scaring the prisoner, this seemed to please the gangster. Then Grigore stabbed Maxim and removed all doubt from Maxim’s mind.

Grigore wasn’t just acting it. He really was out of control.

As they pinned him to the ground, Maxim whispered some quick words to the air.

pandemonium, n. wild and noisy disorder or confusion; uproar. “I’ve been thinking about doing comedy by that name,” Jerath admitted. “But that doesn’t go with the elvish theme.”

Garen Bladerun realized that his leader had displayed some very un-leader-like qualities this day. But at least they had talked to Jerath and gone through his Ritual Book.

That Object Reading ritual (which some of them said they had seen before, when Elyas had used it to see General Zithiruun riding his dragon) sure worked out well. When the drow bard used it on the jewel which Grigore had seized from one of the mercenaries who had disguised themselves as beggars and attacked them in the Plaza of Vision, it revealed five images:

A room filled with books. Lord Telecanthus is handing the jewel to a filthy beggar.

The same beggar in a tall, narrow room. He is handing the gem to a well-dressed mercenary who stands beside a Gluttonous Cube. Partway up the inside of the room’s walls, Jerath showed Garen the remnants of rotted floors, as if this was once a multi-storied building. Now boards have been placed across the room between the remnants, but it really doesn’t form a complete floor. The mercenary is wearing chainmail and doesn’t seem to have disguised himself as a beggar yet, but it could well be the gang-member who held the gem during the ambush.

A section of street serving as a sleeping place and shelter to beggars. Stopped up by silt and soil on either end, this 50-foot-long section of roadway is lined with ancient cobblestones and filled with sleeping pallets and the meager possessions of dozens of people.

An old temple. Garen could tell it was once sacred to Ioun, but those days are long past. The pews are filled with beggars, all with their backs to you, and a filthy and bedraggled priest across the room stands before an altar. Behind the altar is a pile of treasure.

Another view of the treasure behind the altar. A gap is apparent between the altar and the treasure and the gem sits on the altar, separated from the treasure. From this angle, it is clear the priest is the same filthy beggar who took the jewel from Lord Telecanthus and gave it to the mercenary.

pandemonium, n. a condition or scene of noisy confusion. “Maybe you should call it ‘A Midsummer Night’s Party’ or something like that,” Belinda suggested after Jerath explained what the play would be about.

Delis Erinthal was a little annoyed at Garen’s clumsy attempt to follow her. “Just like a paladin: trying to stalk someone while wearing full plate armor,” she thought. When she got to the Market District, she ducked down a alley, found some shadows, and turned herself invisible. The dragonborn clanked in after her desperately searching for some secret passage that she might have disappeared into.

As she quietly exited the alley, Delis heard him threatening to go get the fairy to search out her passage.

Delis quickly determined that the beggars in this area were acting quite differently than they had been around Low Bridge, so she headed for that section of Riverdown, where she quickly found some beggars acting out of character. She disguised herself as one of them and began to mimic their behavior.

It didn’t take long to notice some of them head toward a building marked “Ridolfi and Sons, Spice Merchants.” She followed one of them in and found a trail leading to a trap door with a message carved into it: “Give, and you will be given to.” Hiding in the shadows, Delis watched another beggar enter the abandoned spice house, make their way to the trap door and slip a coin into the slot next to the door.

Once the beggar had disappeared down the hole beneath the trap door, Delis followed and slipped her own coins into the slot. It didn’t take much to notice the sound of a daggerspring trap being deactivated.

Peering down into the darkness, Delis saw a narrow passageway. Lowering herself down into the shadows, the unseelie agent made her way along narrow tunnel which ended in another trap door, going further down. Opening the trapdoor, she found herself looking down into the room with the Gluttonous Cube.

The room that Jerath had revealed with his Object Reading ritual.

“Hmm,” thought the ranger. “I had rather imagined such a tall building somewhere above ground, not hidden beneath the earth.”

She lowered herself down onto the planks that made it possible to stand above the Cube and made sure she climbed down from there a safe distance from the almost-invisible creature. Then she hid in the shadows while another beggar made her way down to the bottom level and passed through a door on the other side of the room.

At this point Delis decided to report her findings back to the rest of the Golden Scales rather than exploring further on her own.

pandemonium, n. the Windswept Depths of Pandemonium are one of the Outer planes. “Well, yeah. I’ve been planning a raid there. Some kind of spoiling action. It’s not good to let any evil think they have a sanctuary,” Storm Johnson said, glancing at Tein.

In fact, the Githyanki seemed to be very visible when he was out in public, but almost invisible the rest of the time. Chance even noticed that the area around the mansion was curiously devoid of patrols, even though the rest of Prospect Hill was teeming with security.

A brief interview with the butler at the mansion turned up no clues, so the Revenant decided to sneak around the back of the house. A hedge blocked much of that approach to the grounds, but Chance was able to worm his way in to find that two out-buildings stood apart from the main house, almost up against the hedge itself:

A stable which held Telicanthus’s carriages and horses.

and

A single building which appeared to actually be two houses shoved up against each other to provide shared lodging for the mansion’s staff. Between cooks, maids, and butlers, Telicanthus employs eight servants.

But Chance’s heightened hearing was able to detect one thing more: The sound of digging, which seemed to emanate from below the servants’ quarters.

An Ambush in the Plaza of Vision...

…Reveals Some of the Beggars in Sayre…

Maxim Shalion saw his chance as soon as the beggars got the jump on the Golden Scales. Pouring out of nearby alleyways, the ambushers crowded into the opening, blocking the way to the plaza.

And that was what Maxim was looking for: a place to fill with a black void of shadowy death.

Pretty soon Delis and Maggie were up on the rooftops, followed by Sam and Jett and Rinoa.

Down here in the alley, there was little to do but blast away at the ambushers trying to push their way out of the blackness to fight Garen Bladerun. It gave Grigore plenty to complain about, since nobody needed healing back here in the alley.

Eventually, he took down the zone of shadow and let Grigore out to do some healing.

Elyas was pleased to Amyria show up at the Temple of Erathis. His collaboration with Magdalene to get the young deva onto the High Council was going well. “They want to test me first,” Amyria told her. “They are sending me out to round up support for a Coalition to fight back against the Githyanki.”

Rinoa realized her mistake as soon as the beggars came running out of the blackness.

Facepalm: “If only I had block them in with Ice Stalagmites,” she told herself. “They would have been trapped in there, taking damage from the shadows as well as the cold.”

Rinoa resolved to coordinate better with Maxim next time. This time, she had tried to use her Dragonfrost to set up another spell. By the time she realized her mistake, she had been pulled down into the plaza by some mysterious gem being held up by one of the ambushers.

Several of the Golden Scales spellcasters had been lured by the gem’s pull. Sam was battling in a nearby alley, but it took a while to get the paladin and the healer into the part of the fight where they were needed.

Amyria told Elyas her mission was a mixed success. “Almost everybody is anxious to fight back,” she said. “But they are all weakened. The attacks came at the worst possible moment for each of them. Only Sayre and Overlook have been spared. And I have been having disturbing dreams about Sayre.”

Grigore Goldforge tried to rescue the mysterious gem which had dragged him into the Plaza of Vision, but it crumbled in his fingers.

The only thing he got out of staring into the gem’s interior was a brief vision: A pile of garbage with a crown on top.

After Amyria told Elyas that she was arranging a meeting of the Coalition in Sayre, Elyas remembered someone else who was going to Sayre. Jerath had a road company whose play, Roland and Juliette, was a big hit in the university town. He told Amyria to seek out the bard and make the journey to Sayre with the company that Jerath was sending there.

Chance Runner was disappointed by the loot. Sure they got a lot of swords and chainmail off the corpses of the mercenaries who were posing as beggars. But there were no magickal items at all. It was almost as if the attackers were so intent on appearing poor that they had no items of value at all.

They even went so far as to rub mud into the rags they used to cover their armor.

Mud! That gave Chance an idea. He inspected the mud more closely and recognized it as looking like the mud near the Low Bridge that connected Riverdown with the University District.

...And Also Jerath..

…As Both of Them Make to it Sayre…

Garen Bladerun marveled at the city spread out before them. One minute he had been mesmerized by the spectacular waterfall; the next, he was staring at the gleaming spires of the University of Sayre as The Conqueror crested the top of the waterfall.

The three rivers which joined to make the waterfall spread out to become the canals of Sayre’s secondary transportation system. Secondary, that is, to the broad avenues and great plazas of a thoroughly modern city.

Garen had heard that Sayre was built on the ruins of an ancient town (his Dragonborn history classes being what they were), but no sign of the ancient ruins remained. The town he saw before him was very much up-to-date in its architecture. As Grigore directed Tokk’it to skirt the city north of road which lay north of Sayre’s north wall and land in the beautiful reservoir east of the city, Garen could only admire the halls of the University of Sayre, the glistening shops of the Glassworks, and the monuments of Prospect Hill.

With The Conqueror tied up to some trees along the side of the lake, the Golden Scales came down the gangplank well ahead of the refugees from Akma’ad. Garen noticed a number of carriages arrayed around the lake.

A servant came cautiously over from one of them and asked: “Excuse me, but by any chance are you the Heroes of Elsir Vale?”

When Garen said, “Why, yes, we are.” the servant smiled widely.

“My master will be so pleased! You’re quite famous; he was just talking about you today at tea. Would you do me the honor of allowing me to introduce you?”

Grigore barged right in to accept the invitation and the servant looked even happier and led them through the throng to a dark-doored wooden carriage with remarkable stained glass windows. The servant knocked once and opened the door. “My Lord Telicanthus, may I please introduce the famous Heroes of Elsir Vale.”

When the tall, spindly man stepped out into the sunlight. Garen was shocked to note that Lord Telicanthus is a Githyanki.

But he quickly showed he’s quite unlike any Githyanki that the PCs have seen before, however. Lord Telicanthus has a warm, quick smile and eyes that make it clear he’s very interested in whomever is speaking. He wears very fashionable, expensive clothing and has no Githyanki jewelry or weaponry whatsoever.

Garen was able to detect only the faintest trace of an accent when he addressed the heroes: “It’s such a pleasure to meet you. We’ve received some news of our friends to the north, but I never expected to meet the heroes in person! Some travelers have brought word of your many battles. It’s very rare to meet living heroes, so this is quite a moment for me. Are you just arriving here in Sayre?”

“Y-y-y-yes,” stammered Garen, unable to hide his surprise at seeing a non-hostile member of this race.

“Well, allow me to provide you with some most humble shelter! The finest inn in the city is the River Jewel, right by the bridge in our Glassworks District. Pennel?”

He turned to his secretary, just exiting the carriage. “Run ahead to the Jewel and book . . .” He looks at the Golden Scales and counts. “Rooms for each of them. Put it on my account there, meals included. Let them know that their guests are people of honor, and are to be treated as such.”

The secretary nodded and hurried off.

“It’s so rare to get people of the world here, artists and playwrights aside.”

The Githyanki paused to consider. “Would you do me the honor of coming to tea tomorrow? All the elite in the city, from the mayor on down, would doubtlessly be honored to meet you. You’ll be the toast of the town. Tomorrow, at my estate — I’ll have Pennel leave details for you in the morning, and I’ll send a carriage.”

Once they were headed up the road to the city gate they had passed earlier, Garen decided to take a shortcut. He sprouted his wings and flew over the river and the low city wall, into the district of Sayre known as Prospect Hill.

It didn’t take Garen long to figure out that this residential neighborhood holds the majority of the city’s grand estates and mansions. Flanked by rivers on either side, the low hill rises gradually over the rest of Sayre. All the richest citizens of Sayre live here. Garen was pretty sure the private mercenary units who quickly challenged him (and kept an eye on him until he was off the hill) could ensure that the neighborhood stays safe and free of crime. He was glad he had not timed his “invasion” after dark.

Soon he came to the The Pillar of Hope Reborn, an ostentatious memorial consisting of a 60-foot-tall pillar with an eternal, magical flame atop it.

According to the plaque this marks the spot of “Auglos the Wise’s tower in Auger, first founder of the city that became Sayre,” confirming what Garen remembered about the city’s history. It’s a good meeting spot for young couples on Prospect Hill who wish to go courting.

The Bard looked up at The Orb Theatre’s marquee. The workmen were taking down his carefully crafted Roland and Juliette sign and replacing it with Titus Androwdicus. Not the original Titus sign, but a new one. A little classier. Now the sign-smiths of Overlook competed for his business. Back when Titus first debuted, he had to make do.

Grigore Goldforge did a face-palm as he watched the paladin sprout wings and fly south over the low city walls.

He continued toward the main gates of the city, thinking that would be less likely to arouse the citizenry than flying over their walls. When he got to the gates, however, the guards were already aroused, telling the Githzerai “their kind were not welcome in this part of town.” Odos was aroused himself, from his usual curtness into anger.

Once they were turned away to make their way to Riverdown, Grigore decided to accompany them and the rest of the Golden Scales followed. At the next bridge they made their way into Riverdown. The quality of the buildings begins to degrade quickly once they got past the tail end of the university district, and Grigore noticed an oily mildew covering the stone walls. Constant mist from the nearby waterfall filled the air. The streets boasted less wealthy individuals running errands, packs of unsupervised children, stray dogs, and people of questionable repute.

Grigore saw a large number of beggars living in Riverdown, and Grigore was certain his obvious wealth alone was enough to be watched carefully.

The Plaza of Vision was where Odos had been told the Githzerai refugees from other areas are living. An open area in Riverdown only accessible by winding through back alleys that branch off of tertiary streets, the plaza is an isolated and dark plaza surrounded by abandoned and rotting warehouses.

A corroding statue of a skyward-staring wizard stands in an empty fountain in the middle of the square. Odo was able to find the red building alongside the plaza, and he led the group there directly.

Odos tried to hide it from his people, but Grigore could tell he was appalled that the Githzerai aren’t living somewhere better. Riverdown is extremely poor, particularly when compared to the university district they walked through earlier, and Grigore couldn’t help feeling that Odos is right in believing that this area is beneath the dignity of the Githzerai.

Grigore noticed raised voices coming from deeper inside the building. The words were unintelligible, but it sounded to him like Githzerai voices raised in anger.

Eventually, Grigore figured out that the Githzerai have splintered into two groups who believe they should proceed in very different ways. One of the leaders, Aziff, urges patience and caution. She is convinced that the locals’ feelings are temporary.

Grigore got the impression she has lived in Sayre for many years, and the recent change in public opinion about the city’s Githzerai citizens has distressed her a great deal (although she didn’t reveal anything but a stoic demeanor openly).

Aziff has the backing of the other local Githzerai, and also of Amyria who came out of a back room shortly after the Golden Scales arrived with Odos.

The other leader, an atypically fiery Githzerai named Gal’ott, has been urging action. Young and angry, he wants to take the fight to the streets, organizing what amounts to a Githzerai gang. Gal’ott and several other Githzerai are refugees from cities and monasteries from elsewhere in the world. Many told Grigore they had traveled several hundred miles to get to Sayre after seeing Githyanki destroy their homes, and they’re appalled that nothing is being done here to combat the threat.

Grigore noticed these Githzerai wear red armbands and never travel alone He quickly became convinced that such gang-like behavior would only add to the local residents’ fears of exactly what Gal’ott is asking his fellows to do.

But Jerath would never have to “make do” again — an idea came to him: “Much Ado about Making Do”? he asked himself; no, that wasn’t it; he would just have to come up with another title for his new comedy — he was a success, having taken Roland and Juliette on the road. And he had found a new home for it.

Rinoa was surprised and pleased to see Amyria, whom she hadn’t seen since they parted in Overlook. Amyria is overjoyed to see the Golden Scales and Rinoa in particular.

Amyria explained to Rinoa that she has spent a great deal of time in the days since she parted traveling outside Elsir Vale. After Magdalene and Elyas pushed her to work with the Council in Overlook, the councilors sent her on an important mission: seeking out the extent of the Githyanki invasion.

“In the process, I have established connections in most of the cities nearby.” She also admitted to Rinoa that she has learned that Githyanki attacks have come at the worst times for the defenses of every region.

“Only Elsir Vale has been spared — at least thus far — thanks to the Golden Scales’ defeat of General Zithiruun. I know it is only a matter of time until the Githyanki try again.”

Rinoa heard Amyria admit to Grigore that she has an agent in the household of Lord Torrance and is suspicious of his connection (as well as that of other prominent citizens) to Lord Telicanthus. An even more surprising admission: Amyria went out of her way to meet the Githyanki Lord at a social event the week before, but she found him genuine.

“But a Githyanki operating so openly just seems wrong.” Rinoa could tell that Amyria is ashamed of her feelings about Telicanthus. She wants to believe that not all Githyanki are evil ravagers intent on conquest, but she is suspicious nonetheless. She was too quick to deflect questions about Telicanthus, his motives, and his possible operations. Her own self doubt was getting in the way of her instincts about the Githyanki, which is why she cautions the Githzerai of acting too hastily.

Amyria told the party that she has learned that two leaders in other nearby cities are seeking out allies. She feels that forming a more concrete alliance — she calls this group the Coalition — between all the besieged communities, city-states, and regions will help them all, so she has been spending a great deal of time fostering this idea.

She has been marginally successful in putting together the war council, which holds its first meeting in Sayre in the morning. "But I myself have little more than a voice in the proceedings. I have no home community and represents only myself and my god, Bahamut. I am being allowed in the proceedings because I organized the event and chose Sayre as the site of the meeting.

Amyria then told Rinoa the people she expects at the Coalition meeting:

Kalad

Fariex the Scalehammer

Caliandra of the Stagrunners

Lord Divian Torrance

Quelenna Entromiel

Inogo Dravitch

Odos

and Amyria herself

Still The Bard couldn’t help feeling a little sad. He had hoped his second tragedy would have been as popular as the first, but it somehow wasn’t in step with the dwarves. Now, the academics in Sayre loved it. That was why he had moved the primary company to that enlightened city — swapping out a few of the standouts from the traveling company, of course, since they were so well received in Sayre — and left the best dwarvish actors here in Overlook to handle the revival of Titus Androwdicus. “I don’t get it. The drow dies in both of them. Why do they like Titus so much better?”

Magdalene felt a certain amount of satisfaction that her efforts to manipulate the politics of Overlook were finally bearing fruit. Perhaps if this assignment to help form the Coalition worked out for Amyria, the council would consider her as replacement for the dead Councilor Mountainhome.

Amyria then told Maggie she chose for the Coalition to meet in Sayre because, she suspects that the Githyanki have some means of communication that surpasses any sort of magic that she is aware of. “They seem to be able to react almost instantaneously to threats that marshal to meet them, and they strike when their enemies are at their most vulnerable.”

When Odos seemed to agree with this, several members of the Golden Scales began talking about how difficult it is to deal with a race which could use doppelgangers and even take over the bodies of real people to insinuate their way into the politics of any group trying to defend themselves against an attack.

But Maggie saw something more: the importance of subtlety in the response to Githyanki attacks in the Githzerai’s own history. This proved crucial later in convincing Odos to side with Aziff.

“Only regions such as Elsir Vale are having luck defending against the attacks,” Amyria told them. She also told them that she tried to get to the island nation of Nefelus, off the coast past Akma’ad, but found some sort of blockade preventing any ships from sailing there.

“The knowledge of magic possessed by the sages of Nefelus is said to be nearly unsurpassed,” she said. “But the University of Sayre is a worthy rival.” Maggie got the impression she hopes to convince the war council that they should ask the scholars of the university to turn all their efforts toward uncovering the nature of the Githyanki’s communication network.

Amyria’s big bombshell came when she told them about a dream she had:

“In my dream I was standing in the midst of raw elements. Waves crashed around me and fires flared, and I was looking down through clouds onto a dark blue night’s sky. Stretching across the sky was a giant spider’s web that was woven between planes. It was silver and sparkled with stars, and at the end of each web line was a Githyanki.

“As each Githyanki spoke, the web sparkled, and a fat spider in the middle listened to everything that anyone said. The spider was beautiful, but you could tell it was evil, just like the people talking through it. It scuttled around, fixing frayed lines and tossing out new lines to new people. Most were Githyanki, but some were not. One of the lines went to a Githzerai.” Amyria looked troubled as she paused.

“I looked harder at the spider, and I knew it was here in Sayre. I could see the city around it. So I came here. I think someone in Sayre is helping the Githyanki, but we don’t know for sure who it is, although we have our suspicions. And we don’t have an easy answer about what to do about it.”

Gal’ott interrupted, “Of course we do. We find your spider. We find him and kill him. We kill him and return to our homes.”

“You think that’s going to solve the problem, Gal’ott?" Amyria asked in reply. "We know of whom you speak. And he’s politically connected to everyone who could help the Githzerai! Kill him and get executed as murderers and traitors. I say we need to prove what he’s up to, and then discredit him. It’s the only way to help the Githzerai.”

At this point, Magdalene decided to step in and help Amyria persuade the brash Githzerai to show some restraint. When she did, Gal’ott could see that she was having an impact on Odos.

He bowed his head and said, “I will comply with the majority. For one week. After that time, my people will take matters into their own hands.”

He stood, nodded to Odos and Azitt, and left.

Once Jerath got to the River Jewel he put his worries about the popularity of Titus Androwdicus behind him. Here he was the toast of the city, almost as popular as the Githyanki turncoat everyone was fawning over. Here they appreciated the nuance of Roland and Juliette. The Bard was not sure he would ever bring Titus to Sayre. They needed something more sophisticated here. Jerath was even thinking of trying his hand at comedy. Suddenly, he thought he recognized the paladin at the front desk. One of his patron’s friends. Yes, it was. “Garen!” he called out.

Sam could tell it was time to convince Odos to go along with the plan Azitt and Amyria were putting forward.

“I see no reason why the Githzerai should not just leave the mortals to their own devices," Odos told Sam. "And perhaps we can attack the Githyanki once they are weakened from your conquest. I fail to see how you can convince me otherwise, but I am willing to listen to arguments.”

Grigore knew it as well. After observing Odos closely to gain insight into his motives, he came over to Sam and told him: “Now that he has had time to calm down after the siege of Akma’ad, Odos remains neutral as to what the Githzerai should do. He personally favors killing Telicanthus and then abandoning the plane.” But Grigore is convinced that Odos was being honest when he said he was willing to listen.

So Sam decided to emphasize the importance of the Githzerai in fighting an opponent like Telicanthus with his Githyanki mental powers. His bluff worked.

Magdalene pushed forward with this argument, trying to show that a victory for the Githyanki would be a victory for Chaos over Order. Sam realized at once that this went to the heart of Odos’s religious beliefs and moved him further toward the kind of action that Azitt was advocating. Hard to see murdering Telicanthus as anything but chaotic. Chance followed up successfully on the religious angle.

Garen took a different approach. His diplomatic approach: Stressing the importance of standing together. Sam was proud for the paladin, and equally proud when Rinoa tried to intimidate Odos by demanding that he look at what might happen should the Githyanki win. But Odos is hard to intimidate and that approach was quickly abandoned.

Grigore came by with further advice about his insights into Odos’s character. “He knows that Amyria wants him to join her Coalition, but is not sure that he wants anything to do with the mortal world and its defense against the Githyanki threat.” So Sam decided to follow up with Garen’s diplomatic approach.

Maggie reverted to the bluff Sam recalled making earlier, painting an excessively grim picture of the Githyanki and the importance of the Githzerai in defeating them. Sam was again impressed when Chance followed this up with a historical account of what had really happened and how the Githzerai commitment to mental discipline had been crucial.

“I have been convinced to stay and investigate Telicanthus,” he told the hobbit. “I think proper use of the right rituals might be just the way to do it. And this city is certainly a good place to learn such rituals. You must take your baggage on and enjoy your rooms at this fancy establishment Telicanthus has reserved for you. Especially if you want to get close enough to investigate him.”

So Sam led the Golden Scales to The River Jewel, scouting ahead and noticing that the beggars (who seemed to congregate around the bridge between Riverdown and the university district on the Riverdown side) did not really bother them until they were near the University itself.

...Named Brann'ot...

…Tries to Ambush…

Chance Runner’s soul felt a strange sense of deja vu, rended by the icy winds of Letherna as it spiraled down toward the gates of the palace of black ice below. Although he could not actually remember previous lives ending in death (as opposed to those which ended in re-incarncation), the book he clutched told him in great detail about the times he had done this before. The abode of the Queen of Death had strange gates indeed, opening on the sky to allow the maelstrom of death to carry the shattered souls of the dead to be judged by the Raven Queen herself: “After all these years, still you play with Death,” she began when he was brought before her.

The young woman named Magdalene looked down from her perch in the crow’s nest of The Conqueror and saw the Gish assassin try to creep unnoticed from the hold.

She could not help critiquing the assassin’s style: “Everyone else has noticed her as well.” The assassin was immediately assailed from all sides by the Golden Scales, but the Gish did not seem to mind.

Eschewing the kind of telekinetic leap favored by so many of the Githyanki, the Gish teleported to yardarm below Maggie. The teleport avoided the ropes and sails so easily that Magdalene was sure it was the kind of phasing teleport she had only heard about. It was rumored to leave the assassins who used it insubstantial and difficult to damage.

Before Maggie was able to attempt such damage, however, the Gish raised her arms and telekinetically untied 8 ropes from the ship’s rigging. She let 4 droop over each side of the ship. It wasn’t hard to notice the assassin’s confederates below leaping to the ropes and clamoring upward.

Dancing along the ropes, Maggie whirled out her kasuri-gama and leaped to the yardarm, knocked the Gish prone. Draped over the yardarm, the assassin did not look so formidable as Spruce Tree flew up to attack her before she teleported back to the deck.

Ignoring the smirk on Chance’s face, the Queen of Death offered her opinion: “Not a good idea, playing with Death.”

Sam the Foresworn managed to get all his allies to concentrate their attacks on the first of the Githyanki warriors to take major damage and that enemy quickly died. But the little hobbit saw the warrior’s spirit rise from its body and he could sense the fear this caused in his allies who quickly shifted their attacks to the assassin who had just teleported back to the main deck.

Sam watched as Maggie plunged from the yardarm to launch a devastating strike at the Gish. The Master Thief noticed a certain level of professional respect in the assassin’s eyes as Magdalene was able to inflict enormous damage even with the assassin in some kind of insubstantial state.

The assassin still had little respect for the tiny fairy assaulting her feet with his miniature staff, but Spruce was able to knock the assassin to the ground, somehow forcing the Gish to come out of her insubstantial state.

As soon as the Githyanki assassin was bloodied, she was able to absorb the spirit of the dead warrior. it almost seemed to Sam that she grew in stature as she absorbed it.

But Sam’s little heart swelled with pride as he saw the rest of the Golden Scales pile on the damage before the assassin was able to phase to insubstantial again. While they didn’t kill her outright before she teleported and became less vulnerable, she was close enough to death that even with their blades slipping easily through her insubstantial body, they were able to finish her off quickly.

But Sam’s heart shrank when he realized his compatriots had gone back to their standard tactics once the warriors’ boss was down: Spreading the damage around so that no one warrior went down too quickly.

As Chance’s soul exploded into mist and light before her, the sorcerer heard the Raven Queen’s final words to him: “Playing with Death has consequences.”

Maxim Shalion saw that Zumos was using his big spells, so when the warriors lined themselves along the the edge of the upper deck, he let loose an enormous spell of his own: The Hunger of Hadar, which leaves behind a globe of impenetrable darkness filled with fanged shadows. He knew that as long as his allies could force their opponents into the blackness the fluttering, flying creatures would find purchase for their fangs.

Sam kept reminding him to use his curses and eventually their enemies started to fall.

When he thought Chance was about to fall as well, the revenant’s eyes started to spark with lightning and he continued to fight like a zombie until he fell over dead.

Chance awoke in the crew deck of the ship where he died. The old, blind sage was finishing the ritual he used to bring the sorcerer back to life. “We had to use the last of the ritual materials stored in the hold, but we were able to bring you back.”

GrigoreGoldforge saw Chance go down and began to wonder. Every other revenant he had ever dealt with — OK, there was mainly one — had the ability to keep fighting if he wanted to. Chance hadn’t even called for healing before he went down.

With all of the Githyanki warriors finally dead (once Sam got his allies to concentrate their fire one last time), Grigore went over to Chance’s prostrate form and tried to heal him. He was well and truly dead, not just unconcious.

When the other party members realized this as well, some were ready to loot the revenant’s corpse. But Grigore refused to let them and carried the body down to the hold. He left it in the safekeeping of blind Odos and his followers.

Once the sun was up and the city of Sayre hove into view, Grigore saw a groggy Chance Runner being led up from below by the Most Exalted Odos.

OK, Spruce Is Really a Monk...

…Not a Ninja…

…but the idea is the same.

Even after Garen Bladerun noticed that blind Odos was more favorably disposed toward the Golden Scales when they told him Maggie and Sam had participated in the killing of General Zithiruun and the destruction of the Githyanki allied with Sarshan, he was still surprised at the reaction of the elderly Githzerai to Grigore’s offer to ferry his people to Sayre. The leader of the Cenobites did not look like he often offered up that much trust to outsiders.

But Garen could tell that even their new pixie friend (as well as Chance and Rinoa) could see Odos was concerned greatly about his people and their future. Glancing at Grigore, he saw in his leader’s eyes that Grigore could tell that Odos was worried: worried that Sayre is only a temporary solution.

“Probably understands the blind guy doesn’t know if there’s anyone he or his people can trust other than themselves, even if he’s beginning to like us,” Garen thought to himself. “Sam seems willing to accept that Odos is a good and just leader. But I wonder if he can tell that his taciturn nature is a reflection of the hardships his race has endured, exacerbated by the recent attacks.”

“Try not to share your thoughts, or your madness,” the Summer Queen asked. “Even your most innocuous comments can bring me pain.” The tiny pixie nodded. Not the first time someone had told him this. Sometimes the rhythm of the Feywilde, which no one else seemed to be able to hear, told him this.

Once Tokk’it had proved Gallia was possessed by a Githyanki spirit and killed her, Maggie had little trouble convincing Odos to tell them about the attack. The Githyanki had attacked without warning, and they sent strike teams to the personal chambers of all the Githzerai leaders, as if they knew exactly where they were staying.

“I hope you’re convinced that Gallia was the one who fed them information on the layout of Akma’ad,” Garen said.

Maggie watched the old man nod as Tokk’it explained that the drawings of the Githzerai leader the Golden Scales had found in the Gith assassin’s cabin on the ship Tokk’it had commandeered were all drawn in Gallia’s distinctive style. “I imagine she told them our names as well,” Odos admitted.

After Chance pressed him further, Odos told them he was only spared because he stepped outside for a walk and heard the team of assassins in my room. “One of them was talking to a strange device.”

Then Grigore took over the questioning.

“I was able to surprise them all. Mr. Lee and I were about to defeat them by ourselves. Otherwise, I might have been assassinated as well. We killed all but one…who got away in the confusion of the main attack.”

“I have need of your assistance,” Tiandra told him, although Spruce knew she would never have invited a pixie to her palace in the middle of the silver trees of Senaliesse if this had not been so. “The Winter Court has taken an interest in the affairs of the mortal realm,” she continued. “And would have an agent there, keeping an eye on those particular affairs…the affairs of the Golden Scales.”

Grigore Goldforge was not surprised when Odos told Garen that attacks of this sort had been happening to Githzerai enclaves all over the mortal realm.

But he pressed for more. And so did Sam. But it wasn’t until threw in a desperate bluff that the old Githzerai offered up the real truth:

“Most of the Githzerai around the material plane of existence have fled to a refuge in Sayre, a nearby city. I want to take my people there now.” This left Grigore pleased that he had already offered to take them there in the ship Tokk’it had stolen.

Grigore had asked Tokk’t to help, but he knew the young Githzerai really wanted to stay with the Golden Scales. A taste of adventure and the kid was hooked.

“Before you ask, I will tell you what manner of creatures the Golden Scales are: A band of adventurers, currently allied with those seeking to draw the Githzerai into an alliance against ancient enemies,” the queen explained. “Aid them in their endeavors and even the Unseelie agents among them — an elf and a hobgoblin — may come to trust you.”

Showing the piece of stained glass to Rinoa, Sam the Foresworn asked her what it was. She told him it was magic, but others had been able to tell him that.

“Seems to be a communication device of some sort,” the sorceress told him. “But one-way only. I think it can only send messages, not receive them.” Sam was able to confirm this when he talked to the pixie about it. Seems that Spruce was following the assassins between each attack and heard the Gish talking into the device. But he told Sam he never heard it talk back. Nor did he see the assassin listen to it.

Once they had all that put together, everybody got together for one final diplomatic push.

A successful push: Odos told them that he and the other githzerai had planned this meeting at Akma’ad to discuss whether or not to accept an invitation in Sayre to meet with a newly formed coalition of leaders from other regions of the world concerned with the extent of the githyanki invasion.

“Each member of this coalition comes from a homeland ravaged by the githyanki, and they’re all looking for aid and support from their regions,” the old blind Cenobite told them.

Sam could see that Odos is bitter that the “humans” sound divided over political issues when there’s so much at stake. The hobbit noticed that Odos tends to call all non-Githzerai except Githyanki “human” and couldn’t help laughing about what Belinda’s parents would think of that.

“I was against going to the meeting,” Odos said. “But now Sayre is the only choice my people have.”

The Prophesy of the Imp...

…Proves to be Accurate…

…to a degree, at least. No one has seen the hobgoblin eat any brains yet.

With Kath’ik and Wellik dead, Blind Odos knew he must lead the battle. As he hurried through the corridors, a squad of cenobites came rushing towards him. “We must hold out defensively as long as possible. Surely, we will be overwhelmed eventually, but it may come to pass that someone will come to our aid.”

Maxim Shalion decided he liked using his curses. They made even his Eldritch Blasts and Hellish Rebukes a thing to fear. The Golden Scales had decided to climb on top of the fortress and surprise the Githyanki from above, rather than attack them from behind.

They were surprised themselves when another group of the mind-bending pirates from the Astral Plane came down from still higher roofs. The Hands of Gith attacked suddenly and died just as suddenly when their immobilizing telekinetic Cold Hands were overcome by Garen’s Divine Mettle.

Maxim used his blasts and rebukes — fortified by lots of curses — to work his way over to the edge of the roof. From there he could see the edge of the main battle.

And lots of targets.

He knew then what he had been saving the Hunger of Hadar for. Raising the Deathbone Rod of Dark Reward over his head, he conjured a globe of impenetrable darkness filled with fanged, flying shadows. Everything in the zone was blinded and their life forces rended. Then it was simply a matter of maintaining the globe and convinced his allies to force their enemies into the blackness.

Taken aback by the optimism of the usually stoic Odos, the cenobite captain stopped in his tracks. “Have you not heard? Someone has triggered the rockslide we use to defend this place.”

Grigore Goldforge decided he might have to remind Chance to pay closer attention to the battle. Almost as soon as Maxim lowered his globe of fanged shadows, Chance forced two Githyanki off the roof into the very place where Maxim had created the zone.

“Bet Maxim coulda used a heads-up on that,” the ardent thought. “He mighta left the globe up a little longer.” He couldn’t help thinking about how his uncle might have handled that. “Probably woulda managed better co-operation between his men.”

But Grigore was soon too busy to worry too much about better co-ordination. The Golden Scales were dropping all around him. Icy fingers gripped their hearts, immobilizing them and making them easy prey to greater damage from the silver swords the Githyanki wielded. His Skauld’s Aura was soon depleted and he had to muster all the healing he had available.

Even for Maggie, who usually stayed out of the main fray…

“I thought the assassins who killed Kath’ik and Wellik had somehow neutralized the rockslide.” Odos was confused as the captain reported the rumors that someone had landed on the roof of the monastery and was attacking the Githyanki besiegers. “Isn’t that where Gallia was last seen?”

Magdalene decided that climbing to the highest roofs of the monastery was the best way to avoid the clouds of dust sent up by their rockslide. Sure enough, the view was unobstructed up under the overhang.

Not that Maggie could see the entire battlefield, but she was able to see her way clear to the doorway where the Githzerai were being pressed by the attackers.

The attacking Githyanki were trying to force the Cenobites back inside the fortress. Seeing that success in that endeavor would allow the Githyanki the chance to fight from the protection of the doorway, just as the beleaguered Githzerai were doing now, Maggie threw caution to the wind.

Maggie used her Ninja-to Rush to leap into the dust cloud from above, following up with an Assassin’s Strike. Realizing immediately why the Githzerai were being pressed so hard, Maggie found herself surrounded by enemies. Out came the Whirling Kusari-gama, which was able to knock many of her opponents to the ground and force them into the black globe Maxim was still maintaining.

Maggie went down, but Grigore was not about to let the Githzerai be attacked again. First, the ardent healed Magdalene, then started healing the Githzerai themselves, and leaped down into the cauldron of death himself.

Then Maggie saw Grigore do something with his Wormhole Plunge that she had never seen him do before: First, he plunged his target into Maxim’s globe of blackness and shadow, then he stepped into the wormhole himself plunging himself back to the roof, then he sucked a Warrior of Gith into the wormhole and urged Maggie to pin him there. When she did that, Grigore was able to plunge the warrior through the wormhole and into the middle of Maxim’s globe.

“Yes, I believe that was where Gallia was captured by the Githyanki. Now, the Eastern Door has been breached by a Githyanki Passwall ritual,” the captain reported. “But the Western Door still holds. We suspect the attackers from above — probably the same ones who released the landslide — disrupted the other ritual we heard being attempted there. No time to investigate, though. We must hold the Eastern Door.”

“I think I might learn to like this Divine Challenge thing,” Garen Bladerun told himself. Sure, it brought him repeatedly to the brink of death, but wasn’t that were a true dragonborn paladin was at his best?

Almost made him feel like Bahamut himself, willing to sacrifice everything to fight for that which is right.

He had started out the battle Channeling Divinity from Bahamut into a crucial Divine Mettle blast which saved one of his allies from the devastating effects of the Cold Hand immobilization the Warriors of Gith liked to use to maximize the damage they dealt.

With all of his friends dropping like flies around him, Garen was glad he could draw so much attention to himself with his Divine Challenges. He wished he could use those challenges to increase his damage as well, like so many of the heroic paladins of old. Perhaps he could do some retraining before his next fight.

Shouting that Maggie needed him, Grigore disappeared into the clouds of dust. Nothing left to do but lay about with his sword. It felt good to swing the blade two-handed. His new shield at least gave him that luxury…

Almost made him feel like Bahamut himself!

What was he thinking? If he used Bahamut’s voice, demanding surrender in the language of the gods, which of these Githyankis could resist?

“Yield to the power of Bahamut,” he demanded of the two remaining Warriors of Gith. The bloodied one surrendered, but the other tried to run away.

Oh, yeah. Probably shoulda waited until they were both bloodied. Garen made a mental note to make sure his enemies were bloodied before he tried to intimidate them. “Some of ’em just go into a rage when you do it too soon,” he remembered.

Blind Odos rushed toward the Eastern Door shouting, “If a hobgoblin rescues us, I shall be very concerned, indeed.” He kept a second thought to himself: “Especially if he eats brains.”

Finishing off the last of the Githyanki warriors was no problem for Sam the Foresworn. Nor was liberating the gloves worn by the miscreant. But identifying the use to which he could put the gloves was a different story.

For that, he would need to show them to his friend Zumos.

Several other members of the Golden Scales turned up their noses at the gloves, although somebody said they were magic. But Sam knew better than to trust such a judgment. Magic could mean “cursed” as well.

He would wait for Zumos to take a look before he actually put the gloves on.

The wizard from the Order of the Septarchs was searching the bodies himself: A lot of bodies — between the rockslide and the fighting, hundreds of Githyanki had been dispatched.

Three troopships full of Githyanki, from all the evidence Sam had seen.

But Zumos abandoned his search when Sam brought him the gloves. The halfling could tell from the look in his eyes that Zumos had seldom seen such a powerful magic item. Which was saying something for a member of the order.

“You seem to have found a pair of Gloves of Dimensional Grasp,” the wizard told him after a careful examination.

Gloves of Dimensional Grasp! Sam’s heart sang. Many adventurers knew about the party trick such gloves could perform: opening a lock from across a room.

But Sam knew much more he could do with them. Sure, reaching through a dimensional portal could extend his reach, but it could also allow him to reach inside a lock and get to parts which might need to be jiggered just so…

...Does Not Make the Best Combat Footing...

…Although Delis Erinthal Doesn’t Seem to Have Much Trouble with It

Chance was glad the decision was unanimous. Everybody wanted to go over the cliff on the ropes and grappling hooks left by the Githyanki Swashbucklers. No more shouting matches which would force Chance to choose between his loyalty to Grigore and his own better judgment.

Unfortunately his own effort with the ropes did not go well. He fell. “Never was much of an acrobat,” Chance thought to himself as he picked himself up in the middle of the battle as the Githyanki closed in.

Once he was on his feet and ready to trade blows with the enemy, the lightning sorcerer felt a little better. He picked his way through the rubble, got near the Mindslicer chanting a Pass Wall ritual, and turned his body into a spark of pure lightning. This allowed him to zip right through a number of the ritualists — including the chanter — really fast, attacking each as he passed through it.

Maybe a little too fast. None of the Githyanki were hurt by his attack. Drawing deep within his reserves, Chance turned back on the Mindslicer and centered his blast on her. That was all it took to disrupt the ritual: The chanter was hurt enough to lose her concentration on the ritual and several others were blown away entirely.

“Pure pandemonium,” explained Tein. The largest kobold nodded. “The battle for the rocks was pure pandemonium.”

Grigore Goldforge was pleased. Chance stuck to the plan and disrupted the ritual. Faster than Grigore would have believed possible.

And the Githyanki Mindslicer went down soon thereafter, victim of Magdalene’s shuriken. “With any luck,” thought the leader of the Golden Scales, “that Mindslicer was the only one who could perform that ritual.”

But Grigore knew better than to count on luck. Sometimes it felt like the gods themselves were conspiring against him. “I mean,” thought Grigore as he healed his heavily wounded allies, “other than the obvious.”

Tiamat. The obvious. Queen of Treachery.

Looking around to see if any of his allies was in trouble, the ardent noticed that Garen was surrounded. “That’s different,” he thought. The paladin was famous for not using his Divine Challenges to attract enough attention.

Sure enough, once Zumos had killed off a bunch of additional Swashbucklers streaming in to help, the sorceror leaped from a nearby building onto the deck of the crashed Githyanki ship and began attracting a lot of attention himself. Several Warriors of Gith pealed off of Garen and soon Zumos was in serious trouble.

Grigore sighed and began sending some serious healing Zumos’s way.

Takin the Scared replied: “Yeah, I see dat. I always panics. Panics usually means pandemonium. Or pandemonium means panics. I always tries to gets away in the pandemonium.”

Sam the Foresworn had taken over the leadership role: Everyone was following his lead and concentrating their fire on whichever enemy Sam was attacking.

So, when he saw Zumos being surrounded by Warriors of Gith, he shouted, “Over here!” and backstabbed the first of these enemies for all he was worth.

“But the next battle was much better organized.” Takin seemed confused at this. Alen tried to explain: “Everybody seemed to know what they were doing. The ritual was stopped, the caster was killed, and the battle was won. It didn’t actually take as long as the first battle, but it seemed faster.”

Delis Erinthal saw what Sam was doing and started pouring on the fire. She quickly silenced the imps who had been pestering her earlier with jibes about her misses.

“I’ll have to be careful about those demons,” she thought to herself. “Their master seems to have some influence amongst the Winter Court’s less savory allies. I wonder if they could be of use to Talyrin.”

Delis still wondered what the Cyclops seer had been so worried about when she sent Delis on the intelligence mission. Something about a vision. Talyrin was always seeing visions.

And this one scared her.

“No panics?” Takin asked. “How you gets away in pandemonium with no panics?”

Maggie wondered if Grigore would really pay her the 1,000 gold pieces he promised as a reward for the killing the Githyanki Mindslicer. The ardent seemed less miserly than he was before being re-united with his wife and children. Maggie thought he might even have become more willing to accept Jerath as an equal in their business partnership.

When the last Warrior of Gith died, Magdalene was already thinking about what she would do with the money. “More gold for the Raven Queen,” she grinned as she watched Garen again take the lead in searching the bodies of the fallen Githyanki.

She noticed he was particularly pleased with a set of Winged Bracers he found. “They go well with his new shield.” She also saw him picking up a Potion of Vitality. “That ought to be useful the next time he becomes immobilized.”

...Breaks Out...

…and Alen and Tien Are Not Even Involved.

Magdalene watched as Maxim Shalion aimed both ballistae. She suggested they don the uniforms of the dead Githyanki who were strewn about The Conqueror.

Once they were sliding down the ropes which were tied to the ballista bolts, the gig might be up. But the longer it took for the Githyanki defending the special defenses above the besieged fortress, the better their chances of releasing a rockslide on the attacking forces below.

Maggie knew she she could disguise herself well enough to sneak into any Githyanki social gathering, but her compatriots were not so adept at deception. Maggie could even mimic the strange telekinetic leaps her enemies were so adept at as she ran across the ropes, but she held out no such hope for Garen in his heavy plate.

Maxim had targeted the squat towers on either side of the rocks. Tokk’it told them a lever inside each tower could release the web of chains which held the rocks to the slope above the cliff. Released the rocks would tumble down over the cliff and crush the Githyanki below before they could overwhelm the Githezerai inside — Tokk’it’s friends from the monastery as well as some visiting dignitaries.

Tokk’it had been reluctant to talk about the visitors.

Zip lines (a short rope looped around the wrists and hung over the ropes tied to the ballista bolts) might get them across in a hurry, but no Githyanki would mistake a clumsy zip-liner for swashbuckling, telekinetic Githyanki.

Still, it was the best some of her allies could do. And Maggie was determined to keep up the charade as long as possible.

The bolt from the forward ballista flew true and embedded itself deeply in the right-hand tower. The other bolt was not aimed so well and got stuck in the chains which held back the rocks between the towers.

Chance got across well enough, but was barely able to restrain his enthusiasm. He almost cast a give-away spell before Grigore and Maggie were able to convince him to hold off.

Then disaster struck: Just as Maggie had feared, Garen was unable to catch his feet on the lip of the rock where the misfired bolt had become lodged. He was stuck there, feet against the cliff, clutching the zip loop.

Almost as if he were standing straight out from a vertical cliff.

Something a Githyanki Swashbuckler might be able to do, but not a predicament a Githyanki would have any difficulty getting himself out of.

So Garen sprouted his wings and flew to safety.

“Not exactly the way a Githyanki would do it,” thought Maggie. So she switched to her backup plan and began shouting orders at Garen and the others.

“You mercenaries! Be careful when you’re crossing!” the plucky shapeshifter shouted, hoping to convince the Githyanki she was the Githyanki in charge of a bunch of mercs.

Next Rinoa missed her zip. Since she was sliding to the better-lodged bolt, she was at least able to catch herself before she fell off the cliff. Maggie saw one of the Githyanki (apparently convinced by the “mercenary” ruse) offer Rinoa a telekinetic leap.

Which put her in front of the rockslide, right in the midst of the biggest group of Githyanki. (This particular group all had large hands embroidered on the front of their uniforms.)

pandemonium, n. wild uproar or unrestrained disorder; tumult or chaos. “I swear it wasn’t me,” Ambassador Tein said during the investigation into what happened.

Chance Runner was convinced the ruse could not be maintained much longer. So he rushed forward when Rinoa performed her telekinetic leap. A large group of the “Hands of Gith” (or whatever they were) rushed over toward Rinoa.

Which put them right in front of Chance…

…at the edge of a cliff….

…So, he blasted them off the edge. “It just seemed like the thing to do,” he said to himself, almost as if he were rehearsing his excuses should Grigore call him on it later. One of the Githyanki (who had no hand on his chest) seemed better prepared than the others for such an eventuality. He hung momentarily in the air where Chance’s sorcery had blasted him, then performed a telekinetic leap past Chance up onto the rockslide itself.

With Delis playing cat-and-mouse with that survivor, Chance joined Grigore, Rinoa and Maxim in taking control of the right-hand tower. As they did this, however, Chance noticed a problem developing at the other. Right off the bat, Maggie had darted through the defenders, getting just inside the door.

But now she seemed stuck — immobilized, if you will — in the doorway. In fact, when Chance moved out toward the edge of the cliff, he could see that Maggie was fighting like a wildcat even though she did not appear to be able to move freely.

Soon Chance learned why: One of the minions with the hand symbol on their clothing reached out with her left hand and made a grasping gesture, her hand pulsing as though it held a beating heart. As she did this (and others were doing the same at the other tower), Chance felt icy fingers grasping at his heart, immobilizing him with fear. In that condition, it was hard not to become vulnerable to the very kind of psychic attacks the Githyanki specialize in.

“That must be what’s holding Maggie in place,” thought Chance. But the lightning sorceror had seen Maggie slip such paltry bonds before. “There must be something more affecting her, preventing her from using all her powers.”

Once the right-hand tower was secured, Chance made his way across in front of the pile of restrained rocks. (Somewhat nervously, he had to admit, knowing that Maxim’s hand was on a lever which could partially release those stones.) His nervousness may have accounted for the fact that he did not notice the grappling hooks being thrown from below until a row Hand-of-Gith reinforcements appeared below him at the edge of the cliff.

Seeing the opportunity, Chance turned himself into a spark of lightning and darted through the crowd around Maggie, leaving shocked and singed Githyanki in his wake. Delis darted in as well and they coordinated their lever-pulling with Maxim via demonic communications devices.

After the rest of the Githyanki were dispatched (first, the new group getting pushed off the edge by the rockslide intended for their fellows below; then with Garen attracting the attention of the survivors while everyone else pounded on them), Chance made his way over to the edge of the cliff to view the devastation below.

pandemonium, n. a place or scene of riotous uproar or utter chaos. “I had nothing to do with it,” Alen swore.

After the dust cleared, Garen Bladerun saw the attacking forces below them had been almost wiped out by the rockfall. Two groups of survivors were still visible: a group whose Passwall Ritual had been temporarily interrupted (the paladin could see they were trying to get re-organized so they could begin their ritual again); and another group who were being driven back by Githzerai Cenobites from inside the monastery.

The grappling hooks and ropes left behind by the force which tried to relieve the Githyanki defenders provided a third alternative: Using them, Garen and his friends could avoid attacking either of those groups. Riotous uproar broke out as the Golden Scales began to debate which of these three alternatives would be taken.

Garen couldn’t help noticing that in the chaos of the discussion he was the only one searching the bodies of the dead Githyanki defenders. When he found a Winged Shield, he told himself, “Sometimes it’s better to be lucky than to be pious,” quoting one of his teachers back in the swamp. “This is something I’ve been wanting for some time.”

“Now what I need is a good two-handed sword,” the paladin exulted as he tried to see if he could wield both of his shields simultaneously and still get some benefit from each. The narrow silver shield extended its folded mithril wings, floating as if Garen was wielding it himself.

When he tried to use his Direbeast Shield with the Winged Shield, however, the paladin found the new shield did not give him added protection. The Winged Shield simply mimicked the motions of his Direbeast Shield. So he decided he would have to use the old shield with the wolf’s head on it as a backup.

“At least I can swing my longsword two-handed,” thought Garen as he stowed his pelt-covered shield in his pack. “Until I get a real two-hander.”

pandemonium, n. the abode of all the demons, after Pandaemonium, Milton’s name in Paradise Lost for the capital of hell. “Well, yeah. We both been there,” Tein said, glancing nervously at Alen.

Using the ropes left behind by the Githyanki, they could lower themselves down toward the fortress. This would give them the chance to swing inward under the overhang where they now sat. Perhaps they could land on the roof and convince the Githzerai inside to let them in. There they could help the monks defend their monastery. This seemed the safest alternative. Especially considering how injured Grigore was himself.

Using The Conqueror, their captured Githyanki airship, they could sail down to attack some Githyanki Delis had spied attempting a Passwall Ritual to get through the fortifications. This held out the promise of disrupting the attackers’ best hope of winning the battle. Certainly killing more Githyanki would make their job much easier once they were inside.

Or they could use The Conqueror to sail around to the other side of the fortress, where a large number of Githzerai were holding off the rest of the Githyanki who had not been killed off by the falling rock. This might prove the fastest way to connect up with the monks inside.

At first the ardent tried to convince his teammates that his injured condition was reason enough to take the safest route. (Grigore could easily imagine an imp showing up on his shoulder and telling him, “It’s not so much the safest route, as the most cowardly route.”)

Then he tried to exercise his leadership to demand they take to the ropes.

This only intensified the debate, with some of the Golden Scales challenging his leadership while others rallied to his side (even though they disagreed before).

Finally he succumbed to Sam’s calm persuasion: Disrupting the ritual did seem to offer the best path to total victory.

Once the disagreement was over, the deva they had just met came over to and showed Grigore his ritual book. Grigore immediately recognized the value of some of the rituals to their current situation:

Comrades’ Succor

Raise Dead

“Well, this would have made the decision easier,” the ardent noted. Grigore immediately went to the hold of their airship and gathered the ritual components they found there to help Kerem cast the Comrades’ Succor. Several of his teammates were able to contribute multiple healing surges to the process.

And Grigore no longer had to fear his own demise in the coming battles. No imps appeared on his shoulder.

Thinking She Could End a String of Errors...

…Which Might Besmirch Her Reputation…

…Captain Iquel decided to launch her troopship — The Sacrifice — to intercept the scalawag who had stolen another Githyanki vessel. Unfortunately for the captain, said scalawag (named Tokk’it) had found some allies — known officially as The Golden Scales — and was returning to relieve the beseiged fortress of Akma’ad.

Kerem was still not sure why the Thraxinium had selected him. Perhaps his inherently passive nature made it less likely that he would embroil the leaders of the magocracy in commitments they might find uncomfortable. “Long have we striven to remain detached from the affairs of the mainland,” Bejam himself had explained. “But now we have rumors that some deva not associated with Nefelus is stirring up the Githzerai.”

Tokk’it was determined to ram the other Githyanki ship before it rammed his.

Demanding the ghost sailors go to full sail while the other vessel stuck with battle sails, he was able to get the jump on the Githyanki captain before she had gotten very far from the fortress. Still it was two ships trying to ram each other head on. Tokk’it had to settle for a glancing blow which pinned the other ship to the side of the cliff rather than sending it directly to rocks below.

While the opposing captain stayed on the other ship, she sent her minions across to attack.

Creeping back toward Akma’ad’s main fortification, Kerem was able to confirm what the Wellik the Elder feared the most: Githyanki ships had attacked the tranquil monastery while Kerem was out walking around, taking in the views of the ocean, and meditating on the serenity he found there. If Most Exalted Odos had not suggested that a walk would calm his nerves, Kerem might have been caught up in the attack.

Delis Erinthal was proud of her companions. They were all taking down the Githyanki captain’s minions. Garen had another stone glowing in the soul-capturing device he wore on his head and the opposing captain seemed frustrated that she had not been able to channel power into her Myrmidons before they were cut down.

But now that she was herself bloodied, it seemed that the captain had grown desperate. She drew her arms back and the ropes on her vessel swung back toward the monastery where she had been forced to leave some of her troops behind.

Those troops responded as if they had been prepared for such an eventuality. They used their own telekinetic powers to leap into the air and grab the ropes, enabling them to swing across and assault the forecastle of The Conqueror, the vessel on which Delis had arrived (before she crossed over and bloodied the captain on her own ship).

But now the captain came across to The Conqueror herself. She seemed disappointed again as the Golden Scales cut down half her minions, but she was able to channel energies into the rest of them. But not able to attack Delis’s allies at the same time.

Not that this could stop Delis’s friends from slaughtering those minions as well, They even killed the more powerful Mindslicers the captain had brought.

But the captain proved a tougher nut than Delis expected.

Wellik had confirmed the rumors: A deva was stirring up trouble; at least, she had asked the Githzerai to become involved in the defense of Overlook, one of the few places which had withstood a wide-ranging Githyanki offensive across much of the material plane. As Kerem watched a brave Githzerai scout sneak onto a ship, kill the captain, and escape with the vessel, he began to formulate a plan: While Kerem’s vow of pacifism prevented him from killing anyone aboard one of the other troopships, he could certainly sneak aboard and sabotage one of them.

Magdalene knew a boss when she saw one. And she knew desperation when she saw it. Maggie’s colleagues had been able to thwart the Githyanki captain — which one was it? — during the early part of the battle, but the captain was obviously drawing on some inner resources.

It almost seemed to Magdalene that the Githyanki captain had grown larger — certainly more determined — as she realized the battle was going against her.

For Maggie had known desperation herself: She knew the resources she had learned to summon up as a child when her own monastery was attacked and she had to escape.

Perhaps the captain blamed herself the way Maggie had in those first days of working her way north. Or perhaps she simply feared those who sent her here. Githyanki were famous for blaming their commanders for failure.

And famous for their punishments.

If that was the case, this captain had certainly channeled her fear of that punishment well: Even after mentally channeling strength into her minions, Maggie could see the captain was taking a lot of damage, but standing up well.

The deva who had requested Wellik the Elder to convince the reluctant Githzerai to rally to Overlook as the best place to make a stand against the Githyanki was apparently trying to organize the resistance everywhere. Kerem’s superiors had even hinted that this Amyria had even approached the Thraxinium about ending their isolationism to take a hand. Absurd, of course, given Nefalus’s long-standing withdrawal from the affairs of the world. But they had sent Kerem here, where he now found himself hidden in the hold of a ship called The Sacrifice. Once he snuck aboard the troopship, the Githyanki had suddenly decided to come back aboard and attack the ship which the Githyanki scout had stolen. Apparently that ship was returning to relieve the besieged fortress. Kerem decided he better throw in with whoever was coming to attack the Githyanki who were attacking his hosts. Strange the predicaments a pacifist diplomat could get into if he really tried.

Garen Bladerun knew his companions would need all the healing he could provide before the day was over. And he knew he had already depleted his ability to Lay On Hands.

Which meant his Helm of Seven Deaths was more important than ever: Each minion he killed now would be more healing later, when they needed it.

Each time he dealt a death blow — hard for a paladin to do, Garen had to admit — another of the dull gems in his helmet would begin to glow with a greenish light as the soul of the dead was sucked inside.

As long as he used the power of the ensouled gems to heal his companions — or to kill Bahamat’s enemies — Garen was confident the platinum dragon-god would approve. But if he were to begin using the headgear to deny those souls a final peace, he might lose his powers to the wrath of Bahamat…or even to the wrath of the Raven Queen.

Who seemed to be working with the Father of All Dragons…

…in spite of their longstanding differences.

When the captain of the Githyanki finally went down, Garen’s thoughts turned to looting. He saw a pair of Night Goggles Maggie had long been coveting. As she scooped them up, Garen began to think of the Diamond Cincture they had found for Chance.

And what he himself had been praying for: A Winged Shield.

“What I really need,” thought Garen, “is a two-handed sword to go with that shield.”

And immediately set to praying. Maxim was trying to use the discarded short swords of the Githyanki, but Garen could see that he was having trouble mastering the tricky blades.

Garen added a prayer to Bahamat that the hobgoblin would stick to wands and daggers.

So THAT'S what a non-minion dragon looks like

A Blind Man with a Demon on his Shoulder

Grigore Goldforge was the first to see the next dragon. It was bigger than the first three and Grigore could tell that the rubies in this dragon’s harness were not glass.

“Worth a pretty penny,” the ardent thought to himself as he climbed down to his companions. Still bruised from his last encounter with a yardarm, Grigore used the rigging this time.

He told the rest of his band this dragon looked to be more formidable than the three they just got done fighting. And he expected its rider was a champion as well.

They had developed some tactics in the last battle — slowing the dragons to prevent their devastating charges — so Grigore saw no need to discuss the tactical lessons of the previous encounter.

Although he might regret that decision before this battle was over…

Most Exalted Odos was not happy. He had witnessed nothing but chaos since he had left the House of Reprisal, back in the Elemental Chaos. Ironic: He spent his life building an island of serenity from which to strike against chaos there at its heart; yet it was here on the material plane, where things were supposed to be so ordered that he was attacked by assassins when he returned to his rooms. And not just Odos: Kath’ik and Wellik the Elder had been attacked as well. “Attacked and assassinated,” he thought. “And now this. Demons. Trying to convince me to kill my defenders.”

Throughout the battle, Rinoa noticed that she seemed to have the most control over the damage being taken by the dragon and its rider. She could always reach them both with her Dragonfrost, although the dragon or its rider could always protect each other from that damage.

But she still had bursts and splashes from the spells she set up with her Dragonfrosts. That could often do damage to the dragon, even when its rider was trying to protect it.

In fact, it was the splash from her acid claws that provoked the dragon into his rage. Fortunately only Maggie was in the blast of fire that heralded that transformation. And she was able to dodge out of the way.

Rinoa noticed that, while the dragon took the damage at first, after a while the rider was blocking it to protect the dragon. The rider seemed well rested at first. Maybe that was why he was protecting the dragon. And the dragon was restrained in the early part of the battle, using single bite attacks (which once allowed its rider one of those quadruple-jump triple attacks Dragonlancers of the Astral Sea are so famous for).

But, once Zumos and Rinoa herself were able to enrage the dragon, who declared his name to be Xirakis, the dragon seemed to grow in stature as whatever was restraining him before was shattered by his rage.

The abbot of the monastery was no longer shocked at the sight of blind Odos striding through the halls toward him with a confidence that gave the impression he could see the walls. When the Most Exalted Leader of the House of Reprisal demanded to know what had become of Gallia, The abbot had to admit the last any of his people had seen her, Gallia was on the roof of the fortress which served as his monks’ home. “She was surrounded by Githyanki. No one believes she has survived, unless she was somehow taken prisoner,” he told Odos.

Maxim Shalion already had a dragon’s skull to show his kobold minions (or “slaves,” as he preferred to call them). So he didn’t need another fight with another (bigger) dragon to impress them with.

A single dragon and a single rider made one thing easier for Maxim, however: Picking who to curse. Soon both lancer and dragon were flying around with a hobgoblin’s curse on them. Sure, Maxim could not use both curses in a single attack, but that did not seem to matter: The dragon and its rider seemed to be able to absorb damage for each other anyway.

Only Rinoa with her splash damage seemed to be able to hurt them when they didn’t want to be hurt. Maxim’s Killing Flames gave him a free attack when the dragon became bloodied, and the dragon seemed quite surprised to find that Zumos was not the only one who could overcome its resistance to fire damage.

Most of Maxim’s most powerful spells seemed inappropriate to fighting and dragonlancer and his mount, so Maxim saved them for a later fight (it looked like this was going to turn into the kind of day only the Great Gark could truly love: fight after fight after fight). Even his Command Insanity spell was overcome by the the dragon’s superior will.

The immense will of both Githyanki and Dragonkind became apparent as the battle drew on. Maxim noticed that the best way to do damage to whichever opponent seemed to be being protected by the other was Grigore’s Unhinging Strike (which allowed him to force the dragon to attack its rider or vice versa, providing he could overcome those towering wills).

Grigore seemed to be using most of his mental augments to superpower his Confusing Strikes. This attack not only left both lancer and dragon dazed, but also made it harder for the targets to hit back. And they were doing a lot of hitting back.

Especially against Grigore.

Unnerved that the chaos at Akma’ad had taken another victim — this time, a young woman named Gallia — the Most Exalted Odos of the House of Reprisal calmed his nerves and reflected that reprisal might be necessary even here on the material plane. “Perhaps it is just as well. Now it seems she has a demonic conspiracy working against her, too.”

When Grigore went down, Garen Bladerun remembered what happened in the previous battle, when it was the paladin who crumpled under dragon attacks. Grigore had used his From the Brink power to bring Garen back to his feet.

This time Garen could do the honors. His Lay on Hands power was just what Grigore needed. The ardent’s inner resources had dwindled to the point where ordinary healing could no longer help him.

Lay on Hands, however, is no ordinary healing power. As Garen placed his hands on Grigore’s scorched shoulders, he could feel his own inner resources flowing into Grigore’s haggard body. As the eyes flickered open, the body no longer seemed quite so haggard.

“Have no fear, there’s plenty more where that came from,” he assured the ardent and returned to the battle.

“Demons?” In the middle of a battle with Githyanki, the abbot hardly expected his distinguished guests to bring up demonic conspiracies. Especially against Gallia. “What do you mean? Demons!”

Pouring on the damage in the hardest part of the battle (after the dragon became enraged, but before the Dragonlancer became exhausted), Delis Erinthal reflected back on the early part of the fight when she had missed a few shots.

But now that she was in her Skirmishing Stance, she was evading most of the damage and hitting her quarry on a regular basis. "Dragons make for the most challenging hunt she thought to herself.

Sure, she had seen the spectacular damage Magdalene had been able to do when she fought from the rigging, but Twin Strike was working well and Delis was really pouring on the damage.

“Yes, demons,” explained the ambassador. “I just had a demon appear on my shoulder. Urging me to kill that young woman you have here at the monastery. I believe her name is Gallia. That is what the demon said, anyway. Gallia. That is her name is it not? The demon told me to kill her. Something about feeding her brain to a hobgoblin.”

Maggie got the chance to do a lot of damage early in the fight, so she took it.

But then she made a slight miscalculation: Assuming that slowing the dragon would not be important, she decided to save her purple poison for a later fight and used up her green and red elixirs.

Sure, the Greenblood Oil did extra damage, but its anti-healing powers were more suited to a troll than a dragon. “Oh, well, don’t expect to be fighting any trolls today anyway,” thought Magdalene to herself as she danced along the rigging and tossed her shuriken. She still had the Bloodroot Poison. And she noticed that a dazed dragon cannot charge.

It was much later in the battle that she realized the dragon’s charges were enabling its best attacks: A successful bite-claw-claw attacks at the end of a charge gave the beast enough adrenaline to power a free breath attack.

On top of that, when the charges ended in a single bite, they seemed to enable a special attack from the rider: At first it was those annoying triple attacks the Githyanki seemed to favor, but later it became a new one that combined a Psychic Lance attack with a Silver Bastard Sword attack.

Once she realized these attacks could be thwarted by slowing the dragon and preventing it from charging, Maggie sighed to herself, “Better late than never,” and applied the purple Carrion Crawler Brain Juice she had prepared just that morning to her shuriken. “That ought to last for the rest of the battle.”

When the lancer became exhausted she decided to take the fight to him. Running out along the yardarm, Maggie executed an acrobatic (and gallant) leap onto the dragon-rider’s back. It all would have been more spectacular had the lancer not avoided her grapple.

But she got her revenge when the rider tried to prevent her from harming his dragon, he brought himself close enough to death that a little twist of the blade was all it took to kill him.

When he asked Ambassador Odos how he knew the creature who delivered the message was a demon, the abbot thought the old blind man was going to explode in anger. Instead, the Most Exalted Odos answered in measured tones, “Because I smelled the brimstone. Because he sounded like a demon. Because he told me he was a demon. Because he appeared on my shoulder and told me to kill a young woman. Because he thought feeding her brain to a hobgoblin was a good idea. No, that’s not what he said. He said I should feed her brain to a demon who belonged to a hobgoblin. I suggest an extra guard to protect her should you happen to rescue the girl.”

Zumos was kind of proud that he had struck the killing blow against Xirakis. The pact dragon did not seem to appreciate the irony of being burned to death by a Cinderfall spell. But Zumos was willing to savor it.

Especially after his friend, Grigore, had almost died in the fight.

But the ardent/investor had been brought back from the brink of death with Garen’s Lay On Hands. And now Grigore was urging the big paladin to use it again (on Grigore, of course) to prepare for the fight ahead.

For everyone in the Golden Scales (even Magdalene was calling the party that now) was aware that there was a fortress under siege ahead of them. More fights were ahead of them, and Grigore was still their best healer.

In fact, he was healing everyone else now that the battle was over. But Grigore’s own reserves were stretched to the limit. While Garen could not offer much healing help in the battles to come, Zumos hoped using that healing now would pay off in the long run by keeping Grigore on his feet through the rest of the day.

Right now, however, Grigore was concentrating on prying the rubies from the dragon’s harness: 14 rubies, and Grigore was telling them he appraised their value at about 500 gold pieces each.

Somewhere ahead of them were cities where that money could be spent. And everybody in the Golden Scales had some ideas about what they wanted to spend it on. Zumos was thinking about a backup staff. Or even a wand. And he could always use some scrolls and potions. He even seemed to be finally understanding the lessons he had in the south on how to do ritual magic. He could use a place to buy more rituals for his ritual book.

And more ritual components as well, although Chance Runner had found a small supply of those in the hold.

The fortress ahead was little more than a monastery. Probably not a great place to spend hard-earn money. But Zumos had heard of a city named Sayre. Somewhere beyond the monastery at Akma’ad.

Maybe it would even have a link to the cities of the south, where the Septarchs exerted their influence. But the Septarchs had never mentioned Sayre when they sent Zumos north to find the lost towers.

Right now Delis and Grigore were arguing about who should go up to the crow’s nest. Well, maybe Zumos was seeing conflict where there was only honest disagreement aimed at finding the best solution. Eventually, the two decided they could do a better job if both of them climbed to the top of the mast. And Delis started climbing.

But Zumos was amused to see Grigore get distracted from his own climb. Maxim had come up with an idea: He would send a small ambassador imp ahead to let the defenders know that help was on the way.

Grigore liked this idea, but apparently wanted more control of the message. Zumos found a lot of their messages amusing and contributed a wide variety of catcalls and derision. But mostly he just laughed at the things the hobgoblin thought would be a good idea to communicate.

They talked to Tokk’it, and he suggested sending the message to a leader there: someone he called Odos.

Tokk’it offered another suggestion: The defenders should be told they had to kill a young woman named Gallia.

The Githzerai scout was convinced Gallia was a spy who was working with the Gith assassin who had been sent to kill Odos and two other leaders. Tokk’it told them an important meeting had been taking place at the monastery when the attack came. He was convinced that the reason the attack came at the worst possible time was the presence of a spy who had told the Githyanki that the leaders were there.

Tokk’it admitted that he did not know the real reason for the meeting, but he had some guesses: Tokk’it was even guessing that it was very important, whichever guess was right.

So they agreed the message to kill Gallia should be sent, along with the rest. Maxim added a number of colorful details, which sent Zumos into wild laughter. But he couldn’t help noticed the slightly puzzled look on the ambassador imp’s face as he tried to memorize the mission and the message.

Just then a cry came from the crow’s nest. Delia had spotted the monastery, cut into the cliff ahead of them. As the fortress of Akma’ad hove into view, those in the Bridge could see two troopships drawn up to monastery — troopship much like the one they sailed.

And one of those ship was being quickly boarded by soldiers. As if the attackers had spotted them and were coming out to meet them.

...Three Dragons...

…at least, thats the way Grigore thinks it works.

As Tokk’it evaded the first of the dragons searching for their craft, Grigore Goldforge saw three more loom on the horizon, blocking their path across the sea towards Akma’ad. The ardent knew that Githzerai would not be able to evade these.

Not without giving up his goal: relieving the siege on the fortress-monastery where Tokk’it makes his home.

Grigore yelled down to Zumos and Maxim, who were manning the ballista at the front of The Conqueror, that the dragons were on their way. But he didn’t wait until he could see whether their amateurish shots would hit.

Grigore was feeling somewhat vulnerable up in the small platform at the top of the ship’s mast. He wanted to get down to the deck, and he wanted to get down fast. But Grigore was a landlubber. He really didn’t know how to use the ship’s rigging to swing or climb down.

So he slid down the mast, ignominiously slamming his butt on the yardarm on the way down.

“He was stabbed in the heart
and he was to blame.
He gives mercenaries
a very bad name.”
—Maxim Shalion

When Zumos looked in the direction Grigore was pointing from the crow’s nest, suddenly he saw movement ahead. Two red shapes flew out of a cloud, changing direction and speeding up as they moved in their direction.

The wizard could make out three red dragons, each with a rider strapped on its back.

He turned to Maxim, aimed the bolt he had just loaded at one of the larger pair of matched dragons, and Maxim fired, but the bolt went tumbling down into the sea below.

“At least it’s water down there, now,” he said. “Not fire.” Then he stopped to ponder whether the water would have an adverse effect on fire-breathing red dragons.

Loading the next bolt, he got a little better aim. This time the ballista hit a smaller dragon which had drawn closer than the big ones. Its rider blocked some of it with a shield, but took damage himself from the gigantic bolt.

Zumos realized that the dragons were now in reach of the regular magic he and Maxim could produce. So he decided to use that instead of a clumsy siege weapon. He could not control the ballista as well as he could control his magicks.

“Concentrate fire on the wounded one,” shouted Grigore. But Zumos was already doing just that, unleashing some of his most powerful spells on the wounded dragon. That dragon proved to be the smallest of the three and went down pretty quickly, taking its lancer to his death in the sea below.

But not before it had set fire to the sails.

“Did you… Did you just rhyme-slam me?” Grigore Goldforge asked.

Sam the Foresworn could not help but notice that his wizard friend was enjoying the surprise on red dragon faces a little too much.

Sure, the beasts were not used to fire as hot as hot as Zumos could produce. But using your best spells before the sun was over the yardarm…well that just didn’t seem wise. As much as the wizard might enjoy surprising the dragons with fires more potent than they could imagine…well, sometimes the little hobbit was glad he didn’t rely on powerful magicks he could use up so early in the morning.

Why … it wasn’t even time for second breakfast yet!

The dragons had some kind of teleporting ability which allowed them to stand off, out of melee range, but that was not going to stop Sam. “Just time for a little dagger-throwing practice,” the hobbit thought as he aimed a backstab at the next dragon’s underside. He noticed the dragons and their riders seemed to have some kind of pact worked out: Sometimes they would take damage for each other; sometimes not.

The dragons seemed to be concentrating their charges against Zumos and Maxim (who could not miss, even with magic he did not seem to know that well). That made sense to Sam, since they were dealing out the most damage to both riders and their dragons.

But Grigore was taking the brunt of it. Just bad luck was Sam’s guess. Every time one of the great beasts was able to get off a blast of fire, somehow the ardent was in the blast. They didn’t seem to be targeting him, but their blasts of fire seemed always to find him in some corner, while Maxim and Zumos ducked out of the fire.

Sam didn’t like that one little bit. Hobbits seldom like to see their healers get cooked.

Zumos was encouraging this, to a degree. Now that the dragons were no longer surprised by fire which could burn even their scales, he was using other powers to slow the great beasts. Slowed, they could no longer charge the two cloth-wearers (Zumos and Maxim). But even immobilized, they were still able to teleport in and use their breath weapons. And Grigore was still taking the worst of that.

As a slowed dragon took damage, Sam noticed something new: When the dragon took damage while it was on the deck of The Conqueror, its rider did not try to deflect the damage to himself. When this damage bloodied the dragon, it became enraged. This rage seemed to power the dragon’s breath weapon.

And Grigore found himself scorched again, renewing damage he had just healed.

“I believe that is exactly what he did,” Tokk’it answered.

Maxim Shalion was tired of be targeted by the lancers. Sure, he was doing a lot of damage to them — and their red-dragon mounts — but he wasn’t always able to evade their silver swords.

The hobgoblin decided to head for the bridge, where the oaken planks were protecting Tokk’it as he guided the ship through the battle. Unfortunately, oak wood does little against the fiery breath of a red pact dragon.

(Maxim could tell they were pact dragons by the way they sometimes sheltered their riders by taking damage themselves. No selfish chromatic dragon would ever take injury on behalf of a githyanki unless they shared a pact which bound their rider to take damage for them as well.)

Maxim called dibs on the head of the dragon they killed on the deck of The Conqueror.

As he hid in the cabin where the big ship’s wheel stood, Maxim saw the slowed dragon teleport to the deck outside the cabin. It was the first time he had seen any of them do anything but charge and hover. Now the dragon simply settled on the deck and let go with its breath weapon. The flames came streaming across the deck, blasting through the cabin door and flowing around to where Maxim hid.

The warlock quick decided that hiding in a small, flammable box (which was all the cabin was to a dragon) was not the ideal tactic. He headed back to the open deck where he had a little more dodging room to take advantage of he reflexes to avoid the swirling flames.

Then he unleashed a spell on the cursed dragon before him. Ebon Claws was not necessarily his best spell, relying as it did on charisma he lacked (as most hobgoblins do). At Maxim’s command, clawed hands crafted from shadow wrapped around the last dragon. Not only did this trigger the dragon’s rage (which forced it to waste its breath weapon on the rigging), but it also slowed the dragon (preventing charges as thoroughly as Zumos’s Ice Storm).

“In fact, he even worked in a dig at you for being a mercenary.”

Delis Erinthal had missed her first few shots, but she maintained her discipline: Keep moving and keep shooting. They might take away her elf license for missing her shots, but never for lowering her defenses.

Then, as the dragons began to be forced to come down to deck level, she began to find her range. Her shots started hitting, and the final dragon (and its rider) both died, spinning downward to the sea.

It seemed to Delis that Grigore was letting his greed rule his eyes. He examined the red gems in the tack of the pact dragon for a long time before he realized the rubies were fakes and climbed back to the crow’s nest. Grigore might have a theory that three ships meant only three dragons, but he wasn’t taking chances.

The Raven Cloak they found seemed a perfect fit for Jett, the other warlock they had found atop Djamela’s Tower, so Delis saved it for the Genasi.

The fires in the rigging were pretty quickly extinguished, and Tokk’it got the ghost crew to put up some tattered replacement sails they had found in the hold.

The first thing Grigore spotted from the crow’s nest was land. A shoreline made of steep cliffs rose out of the sea, and Tokk’it steered northward along this coast.

“Keep an eye out for Akma’ad,” Delis heard the Githzerai shout up to Grigore. “It will look like a fortress built into the side of these cliffs.”

But it was another pact dragon that Grigore spotted first, a red pact dragon so large that even Delis could see the pennant flying from its rider’s lance.

“Hmm, a pennant,” thought Delis. “It seems we have found the draconic champion.”

...Another New Warlock...

…Integrate Himself into the Party.

The pile of sacrificial victims which Sarshan had laid out around his teleportation circle began to stir after the arms merchant died. Another warlock was waiting there: Someone Maxim Shalion missed when he was helping Chance Runner from his bonds.

Unconscious during the fight against Sarshan, Jett joined the others in fleeing on The Conqueror — a Githyanki warship stolen from the Githyanki by a Githzerai scout named Tokk’it. The Githzerai explained that he had been directed to Djamela’s Island by Storm Johnson who was mad that some person with the improbable name of Blackguard’s Bane had sent his giant troop transport to the island where Storm Johnson has a secret base.

It seems Storm Johnson thinks a giant warship might give his location away to the slavers of the nearby City of Brass. So Storm brought Tokk’it over to pick up Duilin Silverfang, who was doing a little scouting for the big goliath.

Since Djamela’s Island seems to have been destabilized by Sarshan’s experiments, everybody decided that fleeing on a ghost ship was better than drowning in the Sea of Fire.

Chance Runner wasted no time in starting to bolster the hull of The Conqueror. He noticed it was damaged. Huge scorch marks on the outside of the hull (particularly in area of the stern of the troopship) suggested Tokk’it’s story about fleeing from attacking dragons might be true. Chance searched the holds beneath the crew deck and found a cache of ritual materials. Still standing in the holds, the revenant was able to cast an Enhance Vessel ritual which bolstered the damaged hull and gave the ship added speed and maneuverability which proved useful once Tokk’it was trying to avoid the draconic Repossession Team sent out by the Githyanki to recover their ship.

Ghost ship?

Well, the Githyanki vessel did seem to Jett to be manned by a crew of Githyanki spirits, although the Githzerai scout was giving them orders. Not the sort of thing Tokk’it seemed comfortable with, but Jett wanted to make sure.

Applying his arcane knowledge to the bridge, the warlock found a runic circle on the deck and a ship’s wheel standing before it. He ignored the dead body of a Githyanki lying in a heap on the side of the bridge.

Probably the previous captain. Tokk’it did say he had stolen the ship from the Githyanki.

Jett’s arcane investigations revealed that the runic circle gave anyone standing inside it the ability to give orders to the ghostly crew. As long as the person standing in the circle had ahold of the ship’s wheel, the spirits would be forced to obey. They might not feel the true loyalty of a living crew, and they might not show much initiative, but they would keep the vessel flying in the direction they were told to fly.

After the bridge was explored and the newest warlock had used his arcane powers to ensure the loyalty of the crew, Grigore Goldforge led The Golden Scales to the captain’s cabin to search it. They found a desk there with a locked drawer (which took Sam no time to open). Inside the locked drawer, they found the orders under which the Githyanki captain had been operating (up until a certain Githzerai scout killed him and stole his ship). Confronting Tokk’it with the note about a spy inside the fortress seemed to disturb the Githzerai a lot, but not as much as three portraits Jett found in the Gish assassin’s cabin.

Since everyone else, including the Githzerai scout, seemed to be dead on their feet, Jett suggested they all get some rest. Earlier they had found the crew quarters where hammocks could be put to good use.

After their rest, Tokk’it took back the wheel and Jett joined his new comrades in searching the ship. First, they searched the captain’s cabin, then the crew deck. but it seemed to Jett they weren’t very systematic about their searches. So he continued looking around that deck after they went back topside.

At the front of the crew deck, he found a well-appointed cabin. He guessed it was intended for the First Mate or some other favored crew. But its most recent occupant did not seem to have left any evidence of a nautical life at all.

Maybe a passenger or somebody.

What Jett found among the passenger’s belonging was three portraits, well drawn and clear. Almost as if they were intended to help somebody identify the three Githzerai pictured in them.

Thinking that his perception would be all it might take to aim the ballista, Grigore took the first crack at it. But it turned out that aiming was more than just looking, and the huge ballista bolt (more a log than an arrow) went flying toward the bridge. So Grigore turned the job of testing the heavy weapons over to Zumos and Maxim Shalion. Zumos said he hit the spot in the Sea of Fire where he was aiming, and Maxim seemed to know even more about the aiming process, but Grigore was still uncertain they could hit a dragon in flight.

When Jett heard Grigore Goldforge questioning Tokk’it about the ship’s manifest, he noticed that the Githzerai scout seemed very upset at the news that a Githyanki assassin was traveling with the attackers.

The others noticed this as well, but Jett decided the assassin (whose name was apparently Brann’ot) might have been the mystery passenger who had been ensconced in the First Mate’s quarters. When the others questioned Tokk’it further and found out there were specialized defenses at the fortress (defenses which had apparently never been triggered in the attack), Jett decided to ask the Githzerai about the three portraits he had found.

Fresh from the success of his first ritual, Chance Runner had to admit that he wasn’t really a ritual caster. But his Master of Storm Dragonmark did seem to give him just the right rituals for the situation at hand. Glancing at the tattered sails suggested either he would have to climb aloft and do some tricky repairs or just try his Summon Winds ritual. With a trunk full of ritual components in the hold, he knew which option he preferred. Filling the sails proved more difficult than he expected (they were damaged by some kind of draconic attack, after all), but Chance eschewed his limited knowledge of nature to cast the ritual with the full power of his arcane storm mastery. His training at the Monastery of the Storm required nothing less.

When Jett showed the three portraits to Tokk’it, he could tell Tokk’it was greatly disturbed.

Tokk’it covered it pretty well by explaining the portraits were of three diplomats. Nobody was supposed to know they were in the fortress. His bosses didn’t share the reasons for their visit with Tokk’it, but he knew that no Githyanki should have known they were present in the facility when the attack started. If a Githyanki assassin had their pictures, somebody had to be leaking information.

Even so, Jett could tell he was holding something back…something about the drawings.

While Jett assured Grigore Goldforge of the crew’s loyalty (as long as someone stood in the arcane circle and had their hand on the ship’s wheel), he did not guarantee their initiative. If they spotted something approaching, Jett could not guarantee they would tell anyone they might not see as Githyanki allies. So, Grigore headed up to the crow’s nest to watch for dragons and the other ships mentioned in the orders. Soon he spotted a lone dragon with a lancer on its back. Guessing it was a scout, he shouted down to Tokk’it avoid its gaze. This seemed to help and Grigore hoped it would reduce the number of dragons he would have to fight in the approach to Akma’ad, but he knew some fighting was inevitable.

Rather than confront the Githzerai scout directly about withholding information, Jett decided to question him more about the possibility that the fortress had been infiltrated by Githyanki. How was that possible? Didn’t all the monks at this fortress know each other? Wasn’t it more of a monastery where everyone was in constant communion with each other than an actual military base?

Such questions seemed to loosen Tokk’it’s tongue a bit. He explained that Githyanki had amazing mental powers, powers by which they could enslave others.

“They have even been known to take over the bodies of their victims,” Tokk’it told Jett, “so their spies look and sound exactly like the friends and family of those they are spying on.”

As the Githzerai said these words, Jett saw a shadow pass over Tokk’it’s face.

As if saying those words caused Tokk’it to realize something that did more than disturb the Githzerai…

Tokk’it’s eyes moved slowly toward the three portraits.

…something that terrified him more than he had ever been terrified before.

Just then, a voice rang out from the Crow’s Nest. “Dragons off the starboard bow!” the voice of Grigore rang out. “Dragons! Prepare for battle!”

...and an Old Hero...

…just keeps on rising.

As Delis Erinthal stepped through the portal onto the top of the tower, she realized that she was not the only one in the Golden Scales who needed a rest. But there was Sarshan standing inside of the sphere of force: They were going to have to stall to get time to heal up a bit before they assaulted the Shadar-Kai arms dealer.

It occurred to Delis that her best bet for stalling him was to try to negotiate a deal: If Sarshan would provide her the intelligence she needs, she would be willing to go and get help for whoever won the upcoming battle — be it Sarshan or be it Delis’s allies.

Sarshan’s maniacal laughter suggested more than mental instability: Delis understood that Sarshan probably couldn’t answer the questions about the Githyanki, couldn’t send her to get help, nor did he have much interest in cutting a deal.

He did seem to have pustules of Blood Chaos bursting out of the scars on his face.

Sarshan then ordered his Githyanki allies to use their telekinetic powers to “leap” Delis up on top of one of the four obsidian battlements which occupied each corner of the tower.

As Delis watched, each of her friends appeared in the teleportation circle, each stalling for time:

Sam was the next one through — he went into stealth mode to try to get closer and find out what Delis and Sarshan were talking about;

Garen came through and tried to intimidate Sarshan;

Grigore pulled out a paper and read it, placing particular emphasis on the phrase “Elyas, Raven, Drake and their companions” — Grigore’s blustery bluff seemed to succeed as Sarshan took great pleasure at the discomfort Grigore seemed to take in not being one of the named targets (which bluff gained some time); and

Zumos was able to sneak around and find out who needed healing.

Tokk’it was glad that The Conqueror could outrun those dragons the Githyanki had sent to chase after him. But he still wasn’t certain about the crew of his stolen vessel. The crew was made up of the ghosts of Githyanki sailors. They couldn’t be happy he had killed their captain, but they didn’t seem unhappy either. And, after the invaders had disembarked at Akma’ad, leaving only the captain and his ghostly crew. Stealing the ship had seemed the logical thing to do.

Sam the Foresworn, unable to find out exactly what Delis was up to, immediately began slicing and dicing Sarshan’s allies. While his allies quickly took out the Githyanki thugs, Sam concentrated on the others. The Mindslicer leaped telekinetically atop a strange pillar, so Sam backstabbed the Githyanki warriors before they could deploy their silver sword attacks to full effect.

As long as he stayed at the helm, it seemed the ghostly sailors would follow Tokk’its orders. But he wasn’t sure they were necessarily putting everything they had into it. Long before he got to Overlook Tokk’it ran into a man using a strange cloak covered with ravens to fly toward Akma’ad. He had flagged down the strange figure to warn him about the attack on his home. Blackguard’s Bane (the fellow in the bird suit) told him that Overlook had been attacked by an entire army led by an exiled githyanki general quite recently.

Grigore Goldforge had to call up a heroic level of healing to keep Garen on his feet. Zumos had taken down Sarshan’s protective sphere as quickly as he could and then concentrated on attacking the Mindslicer atop the nautically themed pillars.

Grigore couldn’t help but notice that Sarshan seemed to envy the Mindslicer’s perch. Sure enough: As soon as the protective sphere was down, Sarshan used a shadow teleport to get up on another of the pillars.

Yet he seemed frustrated somehow. Grigore made sure the others stayed away from that pillar once Sarshan demonstrated his Blood Chaos Flare on Garen. The paladin came close to being turned into a blob of Blood Chaos after getting caught in that attack. (Indeed, Grigore would feel slowing effect of the Blood Chaos transformation himself before the battle would end.)

That frustration stopped when some revenant Sarshan had been preparing for sacrifice was freed and used a Frostbolt to knock Sarshan from his perch. Sure, the sickly Shadar-Kai (who seemed to be turning into a Blood Chaos blob right before their eyes) took damage from the fall, but as he burbled toward them he was able to unleash his best attacks (including the Blood Chaos Flare which almost blobbed Grigore himself.

Blackguard’s Bane told Tokk’it that the dwarves of Overlook were unlikely to commit troops to the rescue of the fortress-monastery where the Githzerai scout lived. A surprise attack by an enormous army which no one had seen coming tends to bring out the conservative instincts in that city on the edge of dangerous wildlands. So Blackguard’s Bane told Tokk’it about another place which might relieve the seige: Storm Johnson had a band of anti-slavery “activists” working out of the Elemental Chaos; maybe they would be able to spare some people to go to Akma’ad.

Maxim Shalion was not sure where he was when he awoke. The revenant tied up beside him was sure he had been swept in some kind of law enforcement sweep of the City of Brass. As Maxim understood it, deserters were somehow involved, although where the army he could not figure out.

Unfortunately, they failed to tie up Alen. Maxim had noticed this about Alen: When you’re a quasit imp who can make yourself invisible, people seldom tie you up.

Consequently, even when the sickly Shadar-Kai standing over them noticed Maxim’s efforts to free himself, he never noticed Alen’s efforts to do the same. The imp’s sharp teeth soon had Maxim free (even before the revenant got himself free).

Since the revenant had been helpful enough to tell Maxim that the Shadar-Kai was planning to sacrifice them as part of the ritual he was desperately trying to cast before the forces attacking him broke through the Sphere of Force which protected him, Maxim decided to send the imp over to bite through the revenant’s ropes as well.

The Sphere of Force fell about the same time the two potential sacrifices were freed, so Maxim decided to join forces with the attackers. He quickly dispatched the two Shadar-Kai warriors who had been shadowporting in and out of the sphere. By then, the sickly Shadar-Kai was being knocked off his pedestal by the revenant and the rest of his minions were dead.

“I like this guy!” shouted the leader of the attacking forces when Maxim got off one of his patented bon mots at Sarshan. (During the time that Maxim was freeing himself he heard the leader refer to the Shadar-Kai by that name.)

But it was clear that whatever sickness caused his scars to burble with orange-purple ooze did not stop Sarshan. It was clear the Shadar-Kai was as formidable an opponent as Maxim had ever faced.

So he sent Alen over on a suicide mission: The quasit possessed Sarshan (who was looking more like a blob of orange-purple lava every minute) and forced him to walk over to the crenelations, climb them and leap off the tower.

Now a fall of 200 feet would kill most Shadar-Kai. And a 200-foot fall into a sea of lava would kill almost anything. Thinking his job was done, Maxim headed for the treasure chest Sarshan had been attempting to escape with.

Tokk’it was disappointed to hear that he would not be able to recruit the heroes who had killed General Zitheruun at Overlook to help him rescue Akma’ad. But he admitted to himself that had been a fantasy (a “fancy” as his girlfriend Gallia would put it). This Storm Johnson fellow might be just the kind to take up his fight. And Tokk’it knew the vessel he flew — a troop transport named The Conqueror — was specifically design to fly between the planes.

Zumos moved across the battlefield methodically. First he set off a Fountain of Flame by the Sphere of Force, taking potshots at it until it came down.

Then he concentrated on the Mindslicer who was attacking him from the top of one of the four pillars which dotted the tower. Eventually he brought her down and it was time to go after Sarshan himself. Some unknown sorcerer was attacking the arms dealer as well. The sorcerer used a Frostbolt favored by Rinoa (Zumos’s favorite sorcerer) to knock Sarshan off his perch.

This turned out to be a mistake (in Zumos’s estimation) because the Shadar-Kai arms merchant proved to be much more dangerous (and much uglier, it seemed to Zumos) up close and personal.

When some warlock Zumos didn’t recognize showed up to possess Sarshan and force him to dive off the tower, Zumos and the sorcerer went over to the edge while everyone else began arguing about the loot.

Sure enough, Sarshan — now little more than a blob of Blood Chaos in the lava sea — began a strange process of climbing up the smooth wall of the obsidian tower. The strange blob would shadowport partway up, swing his sword three times in some bizarre ritual, teleport again, then burrow his way into the side of the tower with some acidic Chaos Nova attack.

Zumos watched as Sarshan kept repeating this unusual method of climbing until he came within range of the sorcerer’s Frostbolt. The sorcerer would knock Sarshan back into the Sea of Fire only to see the Shadar-Kai emerge — each time diminished but more blob-like.

Eventually the sorcerer missed one of his Frostbolt shots, and the Sarshan-blob got within Zumos’s range. But Zumos got a little too fancy with his timing: Trying to surprise Sarshan with the exact timing of his Freezing Burst spell, he created a slick spot on the wall just before Sarshan blobbed onto it. The result left Sarshan surprised, but still clinging to the icy spot on the wall by a single tentacle.

After giving Tokk’it directions to Storm Johnson’s secret hideout in the Sea of Fire, Blackguard’s Bane flew back to Overlook to warn them not to send any more diplomats to Akma’ad. And Tokk’it proceeded to the island near the City of Brass. But Storm Johnson was anything but welcoming. The leader of the rebels did not want giant troop transports docking at his secret base. While he was explaining the urgency to Storm, strange flashes of orange light began emanating from a nearby island.

When Garen Bladerun was slowed by Sarshan’s Blood Chaos Flare, it felt as if his blood had turned into the sludgy goopiness of the Blood Chaos itself.

He was able to resist the further transformation into a blob of Blood Chaos, but it seemed like that was a particularly dangerous attack that the arms merchant had used on him. So he was especially pleased when some warlock with a flair for the one-liners convinced Sarshan to take a dive off the edge.

When the combined efforts of the lava, some revenant-sorcerer, and Zumos were unable to keep Sarshan down, Garen sprouted his wings and flew down to attack Sarshan as he clung to the side of the obsidian tower. Chopping at the tentacles Sarshan seemed to be sprouting from his scars, the paladin dropped the arms merchant back into the lava once more.

Storm Johnson seemed to notice the flashes of light as well. “Come on,” the goliath said. “If we use your ship to pick up my scout, at least it will not be hanging around my base, attracting the attention of the slavers.” With that Storm Johnson climbed aboard and directed Tokk’it to sail toward the other island in the Sea of Fire.

Chance Runner was glad the warlock’s imp had freed him from his bonds. He was sure these folks could have handled the guy who had been about to sacrifice Chance and Maxim (that was what the warlock told him his name was, back when they were both tied up).

Sure, it was the warlock who got the crucial attack on Sarshan, forcing him into the Sea of Fire. But it was Chance who kept him there, knocking him back each time more damaged than the last.

Even when Chance missed a Frostbolt blast, it seemed to him that the others struggled to do the job. Chance was sure that he could have covered it had the dragonborn’s attack not knocked Sarshan back into the lava.

Sure enough, it was Chance who got to finish the blob-like creature off.

Good thing some guy named Storm Johnson came along to rescue them from the top of the tower before it fell into the Sea of Fire.

Running a Gauntlet...

…the Rest of the Heroes survive…

…to face Sarshan himself.

Delis Erinthal was the first to realize the key to this room was not killing its inhabitants: The Spectres and the Lingering Spirits were already dead; even the Flesh Golem was probably made up of dead people. Both had probably survived the Crushing Traps more than once.

Sensing that sticking around in a room (which had its walls trapped and ready to close in) was not a good idea (especially when it was filled with the undead), the ranger sped ahead into the next two areas (setting off their own crushing traps in the process).

And she spotted a door.

That seemed to the agile elf the best solution. She called back to Sam and suggested he get there first. He did and found it untrapped, but locked. It didn’t take him long to pick that lock, however, and Delis was the first one through the door.

If her friends couldn’t make it through, then maybe she could cut a deal with Sarshan. A deal that might get her the answers her mistress seeks.

Chance Runner awakened to what he suspected would be another bad day: A stray cat circled him in the alley; it was black; no way was he going to avoid crossing that path.

Duilin Silverfang had a headstart on the group Grigore had introduced as the Golden Scales. He had been researching this island for about a week before Storm Johnson sent him here to scout it out.

The obsidian tower was clearly the structure described in the histories: The Tower of Djamela.

Djamela was a powerful efreet in the City of Brass who engaged in dangerous research. So dangerous, in fact, that the other rulers of that place of slaves threw her out. Unbeknownst to them, however, she set up on a nearby island in the Sea of Fire. Eventually her search for the Key to Elemental Chaos grew so dangerous they had to mount an assassination team to kill her.

Before they did that, she set up traps and guardians to protect her experiments. Once she was safely dead, many worried about those experiments: Could they be used to rediscover whatever powers she had gained from her research?

But the traps and guardians proved too daunting. No one was willing to risk them to destroy her experiments. So it was decided that the traps and guardians should be left in place, to prevent anyone from recreating her efforts.

No doubt that was what the Golden Scales were facing in this room: The traps and guardians left by Djamela before her assassination. Duilin even guessed that the Lingering Spirits might have been the previous victims of the very traps they now guarded.

When Sam got the door open and the Unselie Agent slipped through it, Duilin saw the Spectres lining up to force him back from the only way out. Then Sam tricked one of them into stepping aside for a moment (boy, did that hobbit have some fancy footwork), Duilin took his chance and raced through the door.

Waking up in an alley is usually a bad omen. When that alley is in the City of Brass, it’s a very bad omen. Chance knew this. He was an expert in bad omens.

Sam the Foresworn saw the wisdom of Delis’s insight immediately. The abilities of the guardians of this gauntlet seemed have many abilities which could knock down or immobilize the heroes.

Getting out was the priority. And Sam was already close to the only door which seemed to offer such an escape.

He headed right over to it, checking it for traps and then trying to open it. Sure enough: It was locked. Good thing that was one of Sam’s specialties. He unlocked the door and opened it so Delis and Duilin could step through.

He made sure the rest of the party knew the door was open.

Then he went through himself, as the spectres had already lined up by the door to push anybody back from the door.

The mercenary did not have a chance to get to his feet before his premonitions of disaster were confirmed: “Get up slave! Your master’s got a beating waiting for you,” the guard yelled as he kicked Chance’s sleepy form.

Still she ended up as the only member of the Band of the Raven to actually kill one of the guardians of the Crushing Rooms.

Not that the Lingering Spirit she killed was actually all that tough. Surely the others could have taken them out, but they were concentrating on escape. The walls of the trapped room (and part of the ceiling) were closing in on them, and the spectres and spirits seemed to have an almost limitless ability to thwart their actions.

Fear is a powerful motivator.

Perhaps it was even the motivator behind Maggie’s efforts to kill one. Because the assassin had a secret way of motivating herself: When she strikes the killing blow on an enemy, she can transfer the momentum of her strike into a rapid dash that leaves her enemies far behind.

So, soon after she arrived in the trapped rooms, Magdalene began to concentrate her attacks on the most wounded of the Lingering Spirits. When the spirit was nearly bloodied, the assassin unleashed a powerful strike which left the spirit unconscious.

That was all it took to give Maggie the momentum to dash past her startled teammates and out the door.

Homeless in the City of Brass, they always assumed you were a slave. It could happen, too. Slavery was the city’s solution to all problems of poverty.

When he got to the third part of the Crushing Room (where the walls were closing in faster than the traps elsewhere), he tried pushing against the walls. He was able to slow their advance some, but it was only a matter of time before the guardians of the gauntlet got there to smother him with attacks.

Sam had left him a small opening at the left side of the door, so he hot-footed it out of the room.

Chance was careful to be polite as he got to his feet and showed the guard his identification papers, proving that he was a mercenary in the armies of Sarshan (before the defeat at Overlook, but he didn’t emphasize that point).

That was the first line of a nursery rhyme his mother used to sing to him when he was young. He thought about it as he considered leaving behind Rinoa and Alexander Winterforged. Was he really “taking good care” of them by leaving them behind?

They knew they had to make a run for it. But, in the end, they would be facing all the guardians of the gauntlet by themselves.

Grigore considered himself the leader of the whole group. So, in the end, he decided to step through the doorway, knowing that both Rinoa AND Alex might die as a result. The other people in the party might need him even more in the coming fight with Sarshan.

Still, it was hardly an easy decision.

“A deserter, hunh?” laughed the guard. “I’ll bet Sarshan’ll pay well for returning a deserter to his ranks.” When one of the other guards pointed out that Sarshan had gone underground after some big defeat, the first guard laughed.

As Garen rumbled past her, it occurred to Rinoa that being the last to get out of this trap might be the hardest trap of all.

As more and more of her allies got through the door, that left fewer heroes for the remaining spirits to concentrate on. While Garen and Alexander were able to use their superior strengths to hold back the crusshing walls and ceilings, this left the Lingering Spirits with little to do but pepper them with attacks.

One of those attacks gave her an unexpected opportunity.

Long ago she had helped a tattoo artist who was being shaken down by a street gang. In gratitude, the artist had rewarded her with a discount on a tattoo depicting broken chains and skeleton keys. He told her the Escape Tattoo could be activated when she was hit with a particularly damaging attack.

When one of the Lingering Spirits wounded her critically with his Spectral Touch, she activated the tattoo allowing her to teleport 15 feet, free of all the spectres and spirits. Then she conjured Ice Stalagmites where three of the spectres blocked her path to the door, sliding them out of her way.

Seizing the opportunity and hoping the cleared path would allow Alexander to follow her, Rinoa sped out the door.

“Sarshan’s always operated underground,” said the first guard, explaining his laughter. “I’ve got a contact. I’ve had a contact since before Overlook. He says he still works for the weapon-seller.”

Ever since he had entered the Crushing Rooms, the dwarf had been plagued by the terrifying wails of the Wailing Spectres. Alex suspected they were banshees of some kind, the pale elves of the Winter Court the older dwarves had tried to scare him with as a child.

When he entered the first section of the gauntlet of crushing traps it seemed as if the wall were already closing in on him. The Terrifying Shrieks of the Bain Sidhe drove him to the walls and left immobilized him with fear. Every time he got up the nerve to fight back, a Spectral Barrage from the Lingering Spirits would force him to the ground.

He saw Rinoa clear a path for him with some kind of icy stalagmites (or was it stalagtites? — Alexander could never remember which was which), but the Sidhe quickly regrouped, forming a line just outside the part of the room where the ceiling was bearing down on him. They drove him back with their wailing shrieks, and the spirits surrounded him.

Fortunately the spirits had been too far away to surround him AND barrage him with illusions. So he was still on his feet.

As the last party member in the room, he knew he had to escape now. The ghosts (as well as the golem) had no one else to attack. Determined to die a hero’s death if he had to die, Alex shifted forward and then made a run for it.

That way only four of the spirits surrounding him would get a chance at him.

One missed, but three others reached out with their Spectral Touch and drained the last of the energy that was keeping him conscious. The ceiling was halted momentarily as it crushed one of the stalagmites, then crushed the last life out of the hero’s body.

And Other Recreational Activities...

…Sure to Warm Your Heart

Grigore Goldforge wasn’t quite sure why he had shared all of his abandonment issues with the newest recruit sent by Storm Johnson to join the Golden Scales. Sure, he had to kidnap his wife and kids from his mother….

…Well, he hadn’t actually done the kidnapping himself. But he had proposed the kidnapping. And tried to convince the Lord Warden of Fallcrest to let him use the Lord’s 15-year-old daughter to help him.

And he had sort-of suggested the Lord Warden’s daughter might help him even if the Lord Warden forbade it.

And that had convinced the daughter to go off on her own to the Shadowfell. Not the kind of place the Lord of Fallcrest wanted his daughter to go off to.

But it had turned out well.

In the end.

Even if it had helped cement Roland’s standing as a spymaster who could be trusted by the Lord Warden.

But that did little to explain why Grigore felt abandoned by Storm Johnson. Storm had been pulled into the Elemental Chaos by forces beyond his control. He had helped Grigore close some of the gates which were plaguing Elsir Vale. He had even sent allies to help defeat Sarshan’s plans to use those gates.

Duilin didn’t understand why the leader of this group — he called it the Golden Scales — wasn’t any more open about the reason they were on Djamela’s Island than the rest of them. But the monk didn’t worry about it too much.

Any help Duilin Silverfang could get find, scouting the place for Storm Johnson, was all right with Duilin. Especially when the whole island began to convulse with earthquakes. Although the tremors seemed to emanate from the obsidian tower which dominated the center of the island, the first signs of damage were all at the edges: The dikes were soon cracked and the waves of lava pounding the other side began to seep and splash through the cracks in the dikes.

Someone else got the the door open, but Duilin was through it in a flash. He saw a pair of centaurs on a ledge over some purple-orange ooze, and he was on them before they had a chance to charge.

That turned out to be a good thing, too. The centaurs seemed to prefer tactics that allowed them to push their opponents into the ooze, which only got worse when the earthquakes cracked the tower and lava began flowing in to mix with the stuff.

One of them was able to knock the monk into the lava, where he was burned severely before the enlightenment he had developed in the Sea of Air kicked in. Duilin turned himself insubstantial and shifted across the surface of the lava to reach some nearby stairs.

He raced up some stairs, threading himself between Sarshan’s Arctide Spiraliths, to rejoin Sam pressing back the centaurs with the others. This meant the two of them were the prime targets for the Abishai Snipers Sarshan had positioned to guard the platform on the other side of the room.

“Isn’t a heliograph a device sailors use to send messages while they are at sea?” Duilin replied as he examined the piece of equipment.

“I mean,” Delis thought to herself, "sure it was good the monk pinned those centaurs against the edge of a long drop, especially when it became clear they horse-humans wanted very much to be charging at the heroes. They demonstrated this thoroughly when one of them knocked Duilin into the mixture of lava and blood chaos.

Delis worked her way past some Githyanki guards to get past the lower levels of the room before they flooded. Even her quick thinking almost didn’t get her there in time: As she climbed the ladder on the other side the flames got to it and set it aflame.

And still: only Rinoa seemed to be following her across to the portal located on the high platform on the other side.

So Delis enveloped a 25-foot intermediary platform in darkness.

“Very good,” Storm Johnson continued. “A heliograph gathers the light of the sun and concentrates it, allowing sailors to send flashes of bright light to other ships. It allows a primitive form of communication. This, on the other hand, is a mariograph.”

Sam the Foresworn was able to use some fancy footwork to trick one of the centaurs into stepping off the edge. The other had to be killed the old-fashioned way: daggers and backstabs.

When Garen carried — once again sprouting wings and flying — one of the less acrobatic members across to join Delis in the fight for the highest platform on the safe side of the room, Sam somersaulted to a statue and vaulted off the flying dragonborn paladin to land in the darkness.

Rinoa pulled up short when the lava flooded the platform Delis was escaping from. She climbed back up the stairs (finishing off the last githyanki along the way) and used her own athletic prowess to leap across to the statue of a large female effreet.

Another leap got her to Delis’s platform of darkness just after the darkness disappeared.

But that wasn’t the last time her athleticism was called upon: As the party tried to clear the portal platform, the elemental snipers were able to blast them back with explosions of sparking energy. No one was knocked back into the deep lava, but somebody went unconscious when they fell back to the 25-foot platform (which was now being inundated as well.

The stronger members of the party were needed to pull their unconscious body to safety while Alexander finished off the last of the snipers.

“A mariograph is an adaptation of the heliograph to the strange conditions we find in the Sea of FIre. Here in the Plane of Elemental Chaos, we do not have a sun to use for communications. So I have modified a heliograph to use a different light source: the sea itself, which glows quite brightly around the City of Brass. This one is set to signal our island from Djamela’s Island. Just set it up on a steady surface, point this sight to aim right at the City of Brass, and it will be ready to signal us that your scouting mission is complete. Open these louvers three times in quick succession and we will send a boat to pick you up.”

Magdalene was late to the party and just barely made it to the tower ahead of the rising lava tide.

Bounding easily across to the statue, she was able to help Grigore organize an order for the party to proceed through the portal:

Sarshan's Defenses Start with a Portal...

…Just Offshore from Djamela’s Island.

Storm Johnson himself skippered the craft that brought Duilin Silverfang to the shores of Djamela’s Island. That alone gave the monk a clear idea of how important the scouting mission was.

Storm maneuvered the Astral Skiff right up to the dike surrounding Djamela’s Island. The dike protected the island from the Sea of Fire, but only just barely. Dulini’s research on Djamela had indicated the efreet had been a powerful chaos mage. He wondered why she had not created a stronger barrier against the lava waves pounding against the dike.

Storm Johnson gave the monk just enough time to step off the skiff before dropping out of sight. Seemed like a good idea, so Duilin scampered down off the dike on the other side, onto the black sand which seemed to make up much of the ground on Djamela’s Island.

Once in the shadow (and everything was shadow alongside the dike since the illumination came primarily from the Sea of Fire itself), Duilin was pretty sure he could make his way around the island without being spotted by the guards.

Those guards were a problem, however, as Storm Johnson had pointed out on the way in. Duilin’s research had led him to believe the only guards left on the island were left there by the forces of the City of Brass. When she was slain, those forces left behind the spectral guards and golems with which Djamela had populated her island fortress, especially in the obsidian tower which dominated the island.

As they had approached the island, Storm pointed out this discrepancy in Duilin’s research. While some of the Flame Shards which appeared to be guarding Djamela’s Island could have been remnants of that spectral force, some of the guardians appeared to be a new vintage: Githyanki swordsmen and some kind of demonic dwarves, as well as a Redspawn Firebelcher.

All of which seemed to confirm the rumors he had been sent here to investigate: Someone seems to have set up residence in Djamela’s old digs.

Perhaps they had even begun to replicate the research she was attempting: research so dangerous she was expelled from the City of Brass for starting it there, research so risky the other efreeti eventually hunted her down.

As he snuck closer to the guards, he realized they were under attack. Reasoning that the enemy of his enemies might be he friend, the monk rushed in to attack the Githyanki from behind.

Grigore Goldforge prepared for sleep with a mixture anxiety and anticipation. A long day left him exhausted and near the end of his resources. And the group he led was even closer their end. Grigore knew Garen was nearly dead on his feet. And yet sleep represented something to fear as well: Grigore’s rest had been disturbed of late; nightmares of some alchemist’s lab kept recurring; somehow, Grigore felt he was failing in dealing with the dreams.

Sam was the first one through the portal, but he instantly knew his chance for scouting was minimal: He came through on a 20-foot earthberg floating on a sea of lava.

And he was not alone. A shard of flame danced on the same piece of rock his portal occupied. And that was not all the guards he saw. Two githyanki had already spotted him and were drawing swords as they stood on a nearby island; two duergar hellcallers stood on other rocks floating in the lava sea; and the earthberg closest to the shore was blocked by a giant red lizard creature which seemed to be about as bothered by the hellish heat as the other guards.

In the distance, Sam could see a city which appeared to be made of brass glinting on the horizon, but he paid it little attention. Speeding between the startled guards, he somersaulted above the lava to land, balanced on his left hand, on the forehead of the lizard. Then he pushed off with his left hand, continuing his somersault to land on the shore of the island, where obsidian steps led up and over the dike which protected the island from the lava which crashed against it.

Flinging his Worm-Tooth Dagger to backstab the startled beast, the halfling managed to enrage the lizard even more.

Then he watched in dismay as Delis and Garen came through behind him, loosed some quick attacks, but did little else to get off their dangerous perches on the rock floating in lava.

When one of the hellcallers invoked Asmodeus’s Ruby Curse, the folly of this strategy was immediately revealed. The psychic damage caused by the fear this curse invokes was bad enough, but fleeing that fear caused the two heroes to slide right off the edge of the earthberg.

Both attempted to leap to another rock, but Sam could see that neither attempt was fully successful: Garen plunged into the lava, while Delis clung to the other rock well below the level the lava was splashing to.

Sam could see they were both in trouble, but he could only save one. He chose Delis as the more vulnerable. He pulled out his Guardian’s Whistle and teleported the elf out of the lava before she was hurt.

Garen took massive damage before he sprouted wings and flew to the shore.

In the dream, Grigore found himself once again searching the house of someone he was sure he was supposed to know. An apothocary or an alchemist. Or something. It all had something to do with a town his family had visited when he was young: the village of Hope’s Hollow.

Alexander had warned everybody that lava was much more dangerous than the Blood Chaos they were all more familiar with. Even so, Garen Bladerun was surprised by the amount of damage lava could do. He was on the brink of death almost as soon as his armor hit the lava.

As quickly as he could he called forth his wings (secretly hoping his actions had been sufficiently Bahamut-like since the last time he called on the powers of the Platinum Temple). Flapping those platinum wings firmly downward into the lava, the paladin surged into the air and flew to the shore, seeking nothing there more fervently than his Second Wind.

Then Garen joined the rest of his team in taking down the Redspawn Firebelcher and the Asmodeus-loving dwarves. This left the Githyanki free to attack them from the rear, but fortunately they had to watch their own rear, as an unidentified monk streaked out of the shadows to help them defeat the island’s first line of defense.

Something seemed wrong to Grigore…in his dream. The house he was searching seemed to be trapped. But he was sure it was the house of a friend, a traveling companion, a colleague. But he knew no one in Hope’s Hollow. The house was trapped, but some of the traps seemed wrong somehow. It was as if someone had been kidnapped and the traps were left behind by the kidnappers to thwart any rescue attempt from freeing the old alchemist. But some of the traps seemed to predate the kidnapping and some seemed to have been laid after the kidnapping.

In the beginning, Alexander Winterforged thought he needed to get off the earthbergs as quickly as possible. And he moved to do so. He knew that lava was a dangerous place to be.

As he worked his way to the shore, jumping from ’berg to ’berg, Alexander helped his friends take down a lizard that fought like a dragon without wings. Reminded him of a Redspawn Firebelcher he had fought once before. In the Temple Between, a place of great importance to his people, known to them as Mountainroot Temple.

Once that lizard went down, they turned their attention to the demonic dwarves who had pushed Delis and Garen into the lava. They had a trick, though: When hit at close range (a melee or a blast), they could call a minion to protect themselves. Those minions could pull a similar trick until finally one was able to dodge the attack.

Alexander realized somebody needed to go back out there and deal with them. He was pretty sure he was the best one equipped to deal with the vulnerabilities the hellish heat out there brought with it.

So, he jumped back onto the closest earthberg and started cutting down the hellguard minions. He was glad to see Sam take down the last with a dagger throw.

In his dream, Grigore felt like he was on the brink of something important. He had found a note, which did not make any sense. Somebody named Taergyn had been kidnapped and his friends were going to rescue him. But what was the note doing in the kidnap victim’s house? Grigore was sure he almost knew the answer. Then he decided to take a new approach: What would his uncle do? That was the question he asked himself.

Delis Erinthal was glad to be pulled out of the lava before it could do any damage, but Sam’s effort had put her right in the middle of the battle.

Not the elven ranger’s favorite place to be.

And the Githyanki guards had battlefield mobility that equaled — or even surpassed — Delis’s own. Not something she was used to dealing with. They were both able to use their telekinetic powers to jump from attack to attack without being touched by their opponents.

So, she was glad to see one of them reduced to using his fists when his sword broke early in the battle. He was still able to throw his opponents off guard by leaping into the fray, but his own attack did little, if any damage.

Delis shouted to a monk who had shown up to help, “We should concentrate on the Githyanki who still has a sword!” The monk seemed to agree. In fact everybody (except Zumos) was able to concentrate on the sword-wielding Githyanki once the dwarves and hellguards went down.

When that Githyanki went down under the onslaught, his friend with the broken sword managed to pick up the silver sword that was still intact. But his attacks were no longer coordinated with the other Githyanki guard, so the heroes were able to dispatch him as well.

Grigore remembered something his uncle had once told him about dreaming and the subconscious: “Only those who can look at their own hands in their dreams can truly be said to be in control of their subconscious thoughts.” Standing in Alchemist Taergyn’s house, Grigore slowly raised his hands in front of his face. Only they were not his hands! They were the hands of his uncle. He was his uncle…in the dream.

As soon as Zumos stepped through the portal, he knew what he had to do.

He had been practicing a particularly difficult pyromancy trick: True Masters of Flame can perform a Burning Transformation, turning themselves into a creature of fire.

Zumos doubted he would ever find a better chance to try out such a transformation for the first time than in the Sea of Fire, an ocean of volcanic lava in the midst of the Elemental Chaos. Even if it were to mean he could not transform back until after the battle was over.

And even if it meant he could not use any power that did not involve fire in some way.

Becoming as insubstantial as a flame, the wizard became difficult to damage. And impossible to damage by fire. This left the Flame Shards at a distinct disadvantage. Zumos’s fire attacks could somehow damage them, yet they could not get through to him. They still thought his fire attacks could not hurt them, but somehow the searing heat of his flames was able to pierce their defenses as if they had no resistance to fire at all.

He was limited in his attacks and eventually used them all up (especially in mopping up the hellguard minions spawned by the demonic dwarves). Then he hit on a devilish strategy of his own: He could dance past the flame shards, teasing them until they attacked him.

Each time they hit, however, his flames were untouched while theirs were burned.

Awakening from his dream, Grigore was able to write down the contents of the note he had found in the alchemist’s house, the house which must have belonged to a friend of his uncle, someone who was a long-time traveling companion of his uncle. For the first time in many days, Grigore felt fully refreshed upon awakening.

They claimed to know Storm Johnson, yet they were somewhat vague about what their connection to the stony warden precisely was. They seemed to be holding something back, yet Duilin found it hard to hold it against them: seemed almost unintentional.

Like When a Bunch of Wights...

…Suck the Healing Surges Right out of a Paladin.

When the heroes finally caught a glimpse of Sarshan, their way was blocked by four cyclops guards. The disfigured Shadar-Kai arms dealer was able to escape once again. Discovering the cyclops were easy to dispatch if you poked them in the eye, the party found their way blocked by four wights.

The wights concentrated on Garen Bladerun, immobilizing him with their life-stealing blades and sucking the life-energies from his immobilized body with their icy touch.

Beneath the giant oak tree, Grigore Goldforge realized that finding the way would not be easy. Everyone in the Golden Scales was exhausted. The pathways were so narrow he was sure it would be hard to bring everybody’s skills to bear on every obstacle they faced. Even finding their way to the simplest path would prove daunting.

After quickly taking down a curse chanter, Sam realized the real danger was the three-headed leader Sarshan left behind to guard the place with all the portals and pipes. While Delis leaped atop the main pipe and turned its valve so that it no longer spewed Blood Chaos into the crevasse at the center of this facility, Sam could see the skeletal figure with the three heads was somehow enabling the wights to heal themselves.

They also seemed to draw replenishment from Garen when he was immobilized by their blades.

For these reasons, Sam was relieved when Grigore directed the rest of the Golden Scales to concentrate their fire on the undead leader. First they were able to take out the head that was spraying fiery death, then the head which sent out bolt of icy fear flopped to the ground.

The third head (as well as the creature’s body) fell before Sam ever found out what it could do, but the hobbit was certain it wasn’t anything pleasant.

When giant roots blocked their path, Grigore could see that Alexander Winterforged would be able clear them with help from the rest of the Golden Scales. Everybody pitched in and the roots were cleared. Then Alexander and his friends were able to rig some vines and swing across a pit of Blood Chaos. Garen Bladerun needed little help to find the way through a particularly labyrinthine section of the maze of roots. After Sam led them down a dead end, Delis Erinthal stepped up and was able to clear some rocks that got them past by going a different way.

Zumos was somewhat heartened by the fact that the wights seemed to be concentrating their attacks on Grigore and Garen. And the party was finally able to cut down one of those attacking Grigore once the three-heads were knocked off their skeletal leader.

When the remaining wights concentrated on Garen, Zumos was able to surmise what their tactics meant: They had to immobilize someone in order to use their icy touch to heal themselves. Their only chance for survival was to gang up on creatures they could use to heal themselves.

Since Garen was already weakened by earlier fights, both he and another wight eventually went down in the knock-down-drag-out battle that ensued. Grigore’s healing powers were no longer able to heal the dragonborn paladin, and Zumos could see that only a healing potion could bring the paladin back to consciousness.

Zumos was pretty sure he was the only one with any such potions left.

It wasn’t easy, but the wizard worked his way all around the battle only to be trapped in an alcove when the wights shifted to surround Grigore. Fortunately, Zumos was able to squeeze along the wall past the deadly touch of the bloodied wights and pour the potion into Garen’s unconscious maw.

Grigore was frustrated: After Sam the Foresworn and Zumos both failed to find a way forward, he needed to find a the way himself. But he and Garen failed as well. It looked like it was all falling on Alexander’s shoulders. Grigore was not sure the dwarf was up to it. In his desperation, Alex fell back on his superior perception. He found a large room, filled with Sarshan’s lackeys going about all sorts of preparations. Delis was able to lead them past with no one being spotted. Going hand-over-hand on some vines, Alexander was able to get them past the next part.

Coming back from a near-death experience like that reminded Garen to ask the question he had learned in a monastery of the Platinum Temple: What would Bahamut do?

Taking the platinum dragon-god’s voice as his own, he intimidated the last wight into dissipative surrender.

“All I want to to is rest,” thought Garen. But his friends were eager to push on and discover the arcane mysteries of this hub. Alexander Winterforged was finally willing to examine the runic circles on the floor more carefully.

Garen could see that they were fired into the floor. Someone had imprinted the runes into the soft mud which once made the floor of this underground chamber. Then the mud itself had been hardened like brick. “Probably the skeleton guy,” Garen mused. “He probably used that withering flame his left-most head could breathe.”

Alexander told him the portals were no ordinary teleportation focuses. He insisted they were capable (with the right rituals) of diverting some liquid substance to other locations on this plane. It was obvious to Garen what that liquid was: Blood Chaos was clearly visible below them in the nearby crevasse.

The rest of the party was more concerned about the other side of the crevasse, where Sarshan had disappeared. But Garen could see that it was just a dead end.

Sam and Delis found a way through last part of the root-filled labyrinth with only a minor delay as Zumos failed to move some boulders which proved to be superfluous to the effort to find a way through.

Everyone was interested in searching the body of the lich, but Delis wanted to know more about the portal through which Sarshan escaped. Alexander had been able to determine that it was strengthened so that even a non-ritual-magic-user could use. But Sarshan had also locked it behind him.

Documents carried by the skull lord identified it as an envoy of Onthorirfel. “I know who that is!” cried Grigore. “Where I come from, Onthorirfel is a famous lich. But everyone assumes he dwells in the Shadowfell.” Which made sense to Delis, since Sarshan (disfigured though he might be) was clearly of Shadar-Kai origin.

The documents also suggest that Sarshan and the lich have been collaborating on some plot, though no details are provided.

Zumos was able to confirm that Onthorirfel is a powerful lich famed for his specialization in ritual magic.

A combination of investigations (including Religion, Arcana and Nature) was able to unlock the portal, but Delis quickly realized that it would take four hours for the unlocking to fully unfold.

...always immediate...

…as an old song might remind us.

As Zumos looked around the darkened swamp, he heard Falrynth say, “This is not the way it used to be.” After a pause, the old sage restated it, “This is not the way it is supposed to be.”

And Zumos agreed.

The swamp, which should have be in something close to complete darkness, was lit by the glow of a strange substance covering the lake as far as the eye could see: Blood Chaos, that was what Falrynth called it.

The purple-orange lava had nearly destroyed the village where the elderly man lived. Completely destroyed the tower where Falrynth made his home, near as Zumos could figure.

Then the old man’s exclamations seemed to attract more problematic attention: A large adult green dragon was circling the oak tree whose branch supported the platform Zumos found himself on. The huge reptile seemed to focus in on the two of them in their exposed position.

He ran for it and the old man followed.

The dragon executed a flyby attack as they got near the trunk of the tree. Then it appeared to swing around for another pass when a horrific cry echoed through the swamp.

The dragon answered the anguished call and turned to continue its flight around the tree. Zumos could see hiding places under the gnarled roots spreading from the oak’s base. He ran down the stairs someone had carved in one of the roots and got to the mud below.

As he tried to make his way around the tree (choosing in the direction the dragon had come from rather than the direction the dragon had flown off toward), he found his way constantly blocked by the thick mud, which made going quite slow. He tried to use his Water Stride on the mud, but this only swapped one kind of difficult terrain for another.

Hiding in Talar seemed a less attractive idea after Megan Swiftblade realized that Sarshan had tracked her there and began to release his vengeance on Elsir Vale in the town where she grew up. The sage there had identified the purple-orange ooze as the Blood Chaos. And she had important information for the council back in Overlook.

Sam and Maggie took Grigore’s advice to heart: As soon as the male dragon took off to investigate the strange sounds coming from the other side of the tree, they attacked the female with everything they had, hoping to take her down before the other returned.

Grigore saw that his plan to defeat the dragons in detail was working: The smaller dragon flew over the root which sheltered her lair and blocked the doorway with her immense bulk. Grigore could see that the Master Thief and Guild Executioner were pouring on the damage with their thrown weapons, while Rinoa pinned the dragon against the door she guarded.

Even Copper got into the act stepping in front of the green dragon. His ability to draw the dragon’s fire did little to protect the rest of the party, however, since the she-dragon was to breathe on most of the party while attacking him. Her terrifying presence was even able to hit Sam, who had found a perch on the root over her lair. Maggie managed to get far enough up the giant oak to be out of the range of both attacks.

Returning to Overlook, Megan went straight to the High Hall and told them Sarshan plans to flood Elsir Vale with the strange substance he used to attack her in Talar. Reluctantly admitting The Golden Scales were in hot pursuit of the arms merchant, she told them they had temporarily halted the flow of Blood Chaos into Talar.

Karic had to leave his wolf-dog behind to scramble up one of the roots. But he wanted the advantage a ranger gains, shooting from a distance.

When his new friends, Maggie and Sam, bloodied the female dragon quickly, the green behemoth let out a cry of anguish and engulfed most of the rest of the party in its poisonous breath. At first, Karic was glad he was out of that maelstrom of sickly, green gas. Then he heard an answering cry and realized where it came from.

Her mate.

As the male dragon hove into view, the plucky elf knew what he had to do. His dog howled, as he began peppering the mighty dragon with disrupting shots, designed to immobilize it. Even when he missed to exact on the dragon wings he hoped would stop it, he was able to slow the great beast’s progress.

It turned its attention toward him. “I guess it thinks I’m preventing it from rescuing its mate,” thought Karic. “If I survive this, I guess I’ll be able to tell the tale of how I soloed an adult green dragon.”

The dog howled again, this time putting some wolf into it.

After working up quite a thirst answering the questions of The Council of Elders, Megan headed for her favorite tavern in Elftown, The Turned Spoon. She asked the halfling potboy for a large tin pot and dumped a handful of coppers inside. When the bard paused between love songs, she began to beat out a military beat on the side of the pot. “Rat-tat-tat, rattle-tat-tat-tat.”

As Garen Bladerun lay in the mud trying to catch his breath, he marveled at the way the large male dragon was slowed by Karic’s arrows. The dragon was eventually able to break free of the elf’s harassing fire, but not before its mate was in serious trouble.

In fact, almost as soon as the second dragon arrived and delivered the first poisonous blast of its breath weapon, Coppershot killed the female dragon guarding the door. This sent her mate into a rage.

As the paladin saw his companions race for the door beneath the tree, he watched Copper moved in the other direction. Garen began crawling toward the door himself, although he was not sure he could make it in time.

At first, he thought Copper was planning to fight the dragon by himself. Then it dawned on Garen that the warden was executing a classic paladin move: deliberately forcing the dragon to face away from the rest of the party.

And the dragon seemed to be cooperating. So great was his fury at the dwarf who had killed his mate, he could not seem to attack anyone else. His terrifying presence froze Copper and caught the barbarian, Esterhu, as well. Esterhu could do little more than whine piteously and argue with his sword.

At least, that’s what it looked like to Garen.

At first the bard looked annoyed at Megan’s drumming. Then he recognized the rhythm and smiled. Who’s the Paladin? was always a crowd pleaser. And he was tired of singing the same sweet songs all the time.

Zumos’s frustration was overwhelming. He could hear the battle ahead, but the mud kept sucking at his boots. As he made his way forward, he could not help but wonder if going the other way around the tree might have been faster.

He struggled out of the muck and up some stair which climbed over the final tree root, confronting the scene of his friends and the green dragon fighting over the body of another green monster.

“That must have been the one that let out the horrible cry,” he said to himself as he unloaded his best spells on the remaining dragon.

He was able to whittle the dragon down enough to bloody it before it sent another breath of poisonous gas at Copper. Only one other hero was caught in the green gases.

“I’m sorry I diverted your show, Tom,” the Freerider apologized. “But I was in the mood for Who’s the Paladin?”
“No problem,” replied the bard. “I’m kinda sick of every lady who comes in here asking for showtunes.”
“The Band of the Raven has a new paladin. And they just rescued me.”
“Oh, I thought you didn’t have much use for the Order of the Black Feather.”
“The rest of them seem brave enough. Just might rescue this city one more time. But that Paladin may just lose his wings if he doesn’t grow a pair.”

Once Sam had the door unlocked, most of the others headed for its safety beneath the tree. But Copper wanted to fight on, and Grigore decided to make it one last offer:

“I will heal your mate, if you stop fighting us.”

But Grigore had apparently mistaken the origin of the dragon’s rage. As a thoroughly evil creature he was not angry so much out of love for his mate. The fact remained: Copper had deprived him of his mate, and Copper was standing there, right in front of him, practically asking to be killed.

The rest of the party beckoned, suggesting that Sarshan was getting away. Copper still wanted to finish off his second dragon of the day.

But, when the dragon’s terrifying presence left the barbarian stunned again, Grigore convinced Copper to join the rest on the other side of the door.

...to Achieve Surprise...

…Leads to a Bloody Battle…

…and a bloody paladin.

The rest of the party did not pause to think too hard about the revelation that Delis is also known as the Huntress of the Winter’s Eye. They went to the basement to explore the voices Rinoa and Delis heard chanting rituals below the bottom floor of the tower.

There they found a hole in the floor. Looking down they saw a Shadar-kai witch and a few Githyanki thugs, along with a large number of troglodytes whose odor could be smelled wafting up through the hole even as they peered down. Delis tied off some ropes and showed the rest how to rappel down.

Garen Bladerun showed a strange reluctance to show off his platinum wings. He recently won them when he was accepted into the the Platinum Temple, an ancient shrine where dragonborn can practice a particular form of esoteric mysticism which allows them to take on the features of Bahamut himself. The wings might have allowed him to fly past the Githyanki and surprise the witch far to the rear of her main forces.

Delis and Maggie, followed by Sam, showed no such hesitation, bounding and sneaking far into the caverns and concentrating their damage on the witch, who bore a striking resemblance to another witch that Storm Johnson once dispatched in the tunnels beneath the Happy Beggar in Overlook.

The agent of the Winter Court remembered hearing that Storm made sure he killed the witch all those months ago, but he never found the body. This was rumored to have disturbed him at the time because Sharshan was using a giant magical bat as well. Delis had heard stories that Storm Johnson was worried that the bat had spirited the body away to some place where Sharshan’s healers could bring her back to life.

Zumos asked to the HIgh Council where his friends had gone.
“Oh, we had to send them off to Talar,” Elder Cadrick explained. “You weren’t around. We needed someone to ask Megan Swiftblade some questions.”
“Talar? Isn’t that some village south of here, near Brindol?”
“That’s the one. We think Megan may know who was behind General Zitheruun’s attack.”

When the new archer peppered every concentration every concentration of enemies with rapid shots, Maggie heard several party members suggest that “no one will ever take Karic’s elf license away.” She figured this was apparently some reference to the bouts of inaccuracy Delis’s archery occasionally suffers. Leaping easily across the Blood Chaos which flowed across the floor, she executed her best strike on the witch.

While the rest of the Band of the Raven concentrated their fire on the Shadar-Kai witch, Magdalene leaped up on top of the three pipes which dominated the north wall. Two of them were spewing Blood Chaos: One appeared to be providing the flow which threatened the village of Talar; the other appeared to be filling the moat and weakening the foundations of the tower until Maggie turned it off. The plucky assassin quickly turned her attention to shutting the other off, finishing the job before Delis could do more than offer to help.

She was just as surprised as everyone else when the witch, plunged through a wormhole into the middle of the Blood Chaos, was able to leap free of the acidic mixture. Maggie guessed that the Githyanki can give those telekinetic leaps they love so much to their allies as well.

Learning that Elyas had helped his friends get to Talar, Zumos was able to convince the invoker to send him to the same portal, which eventually led him to the hilltop where Megan lay, nursing a broken leg. “Your friends took him inside. They needed him. You’ve got to rescue him!” she shouted at Zumos.
“Rescue who?”
“The old man,” she explained, even though an old man was right there, trying to help her to her feet, despite the splinted leg. “Falrynth! He’s helping them go through the portal. But he may have trouble getting out of the tower in time.”

Grigore recognized the witch immediately, remembering that his old friend Storm Johnson had developed a particular dislike for her. He was sure she had gone down in the battle, but he remembered that her pet bat survived.

The bat’s preternatural intelligence might have just been enough for it to get the witch’s body to Sharshan’s healers. While she was definitely unconscious back in the tunnels beneath Overlook, Grigore never checked to make sure she was dead.

This time, when the witch collapsed to the rough floor of the cavern, Grigore shouted to Magdalene, “Take her head!” He was somewhat taken aback when the young woman sliced off the witch’s head without the slightest reaction to the gore.

“Perhaps Maggie has seen enough blood that it does not bother her,” he thought.

The stone structure didn’t seem like much of a tower to Zumos until he had hopped across the rocks in its moat (which has filled with a strange purple-orange ooze). As he began to climb down its stairs, the inside seemed much like a tower. The wizard made his way down four stories and then through a hole into the caverns below. A portal was still active when he found the old man. But Zumos wasn’t sure the elderly sage (identified by Megan as Falrynth) could climb the rope to get out of the hole without help.

Once the troglodytes and Githyanki were dispatched, Karic was able to pick up a silver sword. While he knew he was not much of a swordsman, the elf felt better having a backup weapon he could use in melee.

The old sage was able to tell them some details about the chalk circle the witch was using for her ritual. “It was apparently being used to escape,” he explained. “It seems to be set up to take these miscreants to a swamp far to the south. That particular swamp is familiar to all sages, famous for its large trees and primordial fauna.”

Once Magdalene was able to convince Megan she should think of them as her friends, the rest of Karic’s new-found friends were able to help him pry some information from her:

Three assassination attempts have so far been made against Megan and the Freeriders. The rest of the group have scattered across Elsir Vale in an attempt to prevent further attacks.

Through a mercenary band that escaped from the failed attack on Overlook, the Freeriders discovered that a shadar-kai arms dealer — Sarshan — was providing mercenaries, intelligence, support, and even arms and armor to the githyanki assault.

Sarshan’s current plots revolve around something called Blood Chaos, with which he means to take retribution against Overlook and Elsir Vale.

Although Megan did not appear to understand what Blood Chaos is, Karic could tell Falrynth knew the name. “I’m guessing the orange ooze is the Blood Chaos,” he said. “Hidden portals and secret weak spots connecting to other planes are all over Elsir Vale. Sarshan’s knowledge of planar magic probably give him the power to deliver Blood Chaos anywhere in the vale.”

Karic’s heart sank as he realized what this meant: The scene of destruction he had just witnessed in Talar would be repeated all over Elsir Vale unless Sarshan can be stopped first.

Most of the rest of his new friends seemed to realize this as well, but not the paladin. Badly wounded in the battles, Garen seemed to be on his last legs. Only a stirring speech from Grigore and the ridicule of Megan were able to convince the dragonborn paladin to let Falrynth send him through the portal to the swamp with the rest of the group.

Just then, Zumos felt the ground shake and the entire cavern felt like it dropped 20 or 30 feet before stabilizing again.
“Can you hear it?” the old man asked.
“The only thing I hear is water gushing down towards us. Maybe it’s that orange stuff.”
“Oh, it’s the Blood Chaos all right. I guess there’s only one way out.” With that, the old man rushed through the portal. Zumos had no choice but to follow.

As Sam shifted through the haze of the portal, the entire party emerged on a wooden platform set upon the skeletal branch of an immense oak tree. The oak tree stood in the middle of a dismal, fog-shrouded swamp, the tree surrounded by a lake of Blood Chaos. Its huge roots snaked through the boiling ooze like great vipers, while above you, a thick canopy of leaves cut the light to a perpetual gloom.

Urging quiet, Sam made his way to the thick mud below. Some of the roots blocked his path around the tree, but someone had apparently dug tunnels beneath them. Beyond the second tunnel, the Master Thief found his way blocked by the Blood Chaos itself.

There Maggie was able to demonstrate her leaping abilities, ghosting across and tossing a rope back to Sam. Fastening both ends, they were able to rig a crossing for the rest.

Scouting through two more tunnels, Sam found an entrance to the caverns beneath the giant oak. Unfortunately, the caverns seemed to be guarded by two large green dragons. The dragons did not here the stealthy hobbit, but voices could be heard further around the truck of the giant tree.

The dragons heard the voices as well. And one of them took off to investigate.

The Huntress of the Winter's Eye unmasked...

…by Falrynth,…

…the sage she had gone downstairs to save.

Once the heroes raced up the hill toward the tower (the strange orange-purple lava seemed to be issuing forth from its base and threatening the village of Talar as the tower itself slowly sank into the hill beneath it), Garen again demonstrated the advantage of being able to sprout wings and fly.

He rescued a terrified old man from the top of the tower before it sank into the lava-filled moat. Magdalene bounded across some rocks that had fallen into the moat and rescued an adventurer whose leg had been broken in the aftermath of the earthquakes (which seem to be associated with the sinking of the tower).

This woman turned out to be none other than Megan Swiftblade: the leader of the Freeriders who has discovered the identity of the force behind the war on Overlook.

But Megan had a more urgent task than revealing this secret: She and the old man were more concerned about someone still trapped in the tower, a sage named Falrynth.

When Delis and Rinoa got Falrynth back up to the fourth floor (where the rest of the party waited amidst the wreckage of the cages which once housed the sage’s menagerie), they immediately began to question him about what they had seen lurking below. Rinoa got him talking:
“I don’t know who those people down there are,” Falrynth admitted.

Seeing how easily Maggie got across, Sam scampered across on his own to do a little scouting. Peering down the spiral staircase, he spotted something lurking amidst some damaged cages. He was able to work his way down, hoping to listen at the double doors he spotted in the dim light.

The little hobbit’s efforts at stealth proved unnecessary as Garen Bladerun came storming in soon after. That attracted the attention of the elemental Mezzodaemon sufficiently to allow Sam to creep over and listen at the door.

He was able to hear sounds through the door (even as the rest of the party got stalled on the spiral staircase leading from the roof). But it wasn’t until the scout peeked through the doors that his efforts paid off: Just beyond, he could see two Grimlocks preparing an ambush.

Fortunately, they did not spot the stealthy halfling.

Delis took a more aggressive tack:
“I know you’re not telling us everything,” she shouted into the sage’s face. At first this intimidation did not seem to be working. Then Delis played her ace in the hole.

It wasn’t until the heroes had finished off the daemon that Garen thought to ask Sam what he had found. After the hobbit explained that he was the one who had piled the remnants of a weapons locker against the doors, Garen pushed the box aside, threw open the door, and stepped inside to attack the nearest Grimlock.

Their trap sprung, the Grimlocks attacked first. Garen retaliated and saw the room was full of enemies, Grimlocks and Mezzodaemons together in some unlikely alliance.

As the battle raged on Garen pushed further in, only to find himself completely surrounded by enemies. He brushed aside Grigore‘s offer of healing and used up all of his god’s daily allotment of Lay-on-Hands to heal himself before the battle was through.

(Well, actually he did use the last one on a certain barbarian once he had worked his way back to the adventurers’ side of the doorway.)

Esterhu seemed to Garen to be in some conflict with his sword, almost terrified of the danger Wicked Fang was urging him into. The minotaur was actually making threatening faces at his own sword.

Eventually, the rest of the daemons and grimlocks were lured back toward their cages by Copper and Garen. There, they wasted their efforts trying to get past Copper’s defenses. Esterhu finally brought out his Tide of Blood (far too late for Wicked Fang preferences) and he and Delis laid some serious damage down to finish off all but the last of the monsters.

Garen smiled to himself as he contemplated the large number of gems glowing greenly in his helm.

Her fellow party-member were just as surprised as Falrinth when Delis‘s eyes began to glow. But they did not seem to understand the significance as quickly as the sage did:
“You! You’re an unseelie agent!" the sage cowered away from Delis. “I knew nothing of any tunnels under this tower. I’m sure those performing the ritual down there are responsible for what is happening to this tower. And to Talar.”

It took everything they had for The Golden Scales to take out their last foe: It seemed to be some kind of aberrant creature, an outsider of blue coloration.

At first, the blue swirls on the Foulspawn Seer might have been mistaken for tattoos on some strangely-colored epidermis. But on closer examination some of the party were able to tell that it was more like the creature had been flayed, exposing its musculature directly. But even that was hard to see, since the muscles were arranged in such unlikely alien patterns that just looking at it made Grigore’s head hurt.

The Foulspawn had long since established its ability to teleport through the wall, so The Golden Scales had to cover both sides to be sure they could always hit it. Esterhu was able to cover the area of the shattered cages. The two tanks were able to catch him on the other side and force him to attack them there.

Delis was also on that side and peppered the outsider with arrows. When it went down, someone suggested looting the bodies.

“Yes,” Delis Erinthal replied, her eyes now glowing so brightly they illuminated a 20-foot circle. “It is true. I am the Huntress of the Winter’s Eye.”

“Are you out of your minds?” screamed Delis. “We are in a tower which has already sunk four stories into a pool of lava. We still have to rescue the old man.”

While the rest of the Golden Scales healed up, Delis and Rinoa explored all the way to the kitchen level of the tower. There, in the pantry, they found Falrynth, quivering among the toppled shelves and broken pottery.

Outside the pantry, a hole gaped in the floor. A purple-orange glow could be seen down in the hole and the chanting of ritual magic could be heard. They took the old sage upstairs where the rest of the group waited.

...and fly over a moving mass of Blood Chaos...

…comes in handy…

…when there is a pregnant woman trapped on a wagon in the midst of the Blood Chaos. Or, at least, that is what Garen Bladerun would have us believe.

With much of the party immobilized by tentacles sprouting from strange blobs of purple-orange ichor sprinkled along the street (including Garen himself), Grigore ordered the three who had avoid the tentacles (Sam, Delis and Karic) to rush to the woman’s rescue. But Garen showed that he could easily shake off the tentacles (which held some of the heroes for a while) and sprouted wings.

Then the paladin healed the woman of her hysterics, clasped her in his steel-clad arms and flew her to safety.

“Marrik, have you heard what the latest addition to your favorite adventuring group has said about Overlook?” the gruff old dwarf complained.
“Latest addition?” Marrik Ironfell was taken aback. “Someone has joined the Moldy Scales?”
“Some rune-priest. Who goes around Overlook complaining about how he can’t find someone to do some ritual for him.”

Even with some of the party still trapped in the tentacles, the heroes of the Golden Scales were able to concentrate their efforts against the Scion of Chaos. Which was quickly dispatched, even though some daily powers were used against it.

This undulating orb of melting orange and purple flesh writhed toward them on a bed of muscular tentacles, a ring of larger tentacles jutting from the top of the orb. It seemed to be the source of the tentacles (as they never reappeared after it was dead).

“A ritual? What kind of ritual? Sounds like a cultist to me.”
“He called it a ‘Make Whole’ ritual. Said it could repair his hammer for him.”
“Repair his hammer? Who needs a ritual to do something any smith worthy of the name could do at his anvil?”

Then all party cohesion broke down. Huge hulking creatures seemingly composed of congealed purple-orange liquid emerged from the blood chaos, along with paper-thin bat-like flyers with much the same coloration. The heads of the huge Chaos Maulers had no eyes or other features and a single tentacle grew from its belly.

The flying Skulking Terrors were dripping the ichor which had caught the heroes unaware at the start of the battle.

Once they knew to look for it, the adventurers had little difficulty avoided the ichor. Indeed, Delis was able to avoid the Skulking Terrors which pursued her without difficulty, even as she had some difficulty finishing them off.

“I’m telling you he sounds more like a cultist every minute,” Marrik concluded.
“I’ll buy that. I heard the cultists get so powerful down south they run whole cities.”
“Empires, even. Have you seen my latest flyer?”

Garen discovered the minions were the perfect thing to power up his Helm of the Seven Deaths.

The other heroes noticed that every time he killed a Chaos Mauler one of the green gems in his helmet began to glow

He seemed to think this was a good thing.

“Flyer? Marrik, are you passing out papers again?”
“This one is different. Take a look”
“The Wit and Wisdom of Jerath?” the old dwarf asked. “At least it should be more popular than your last diatribe.”

The Chaos Maulers seemed to prefer a tactic that involved getting between two enemies and attacking both. But they had so much trouble hitting the heroes that it wasn’t until only one was left that they discovered why.

When the last huge creature hit two enemies at once, it was able to use the blood dripping from their wounds to divide into two.

“I thought you hated the bard,” the gruff dwarf said. “These seem to be some of his best lines.”
“How do you know they’re his lines?” Marrik Ironfell asked.
“Because they’re in his play!”

When the party finally got organized they quickly dispatched the rest of the Terrors while Garen finished the Maulers.

Just then, the ground trembled again and their eyes were drawn toward the mottled tower…

...to the Sheltering Arms of the Blood Chaos...

…the Golden Scales (or the Band of the Raven)…

…seeks to free the oppressed peoples of the world.

Raven, on the other hand, is a much simpler man: He seeks only The Tools of Zane’s Vengeance, that he might use them to extract his own vengeance on the shadar-kai arms dealer who asked him to create Wicked Fang — Sharshan.

Zane himself appears nightly in his dreams, as if the long-dead shaman has singled him out to use the set of equipment Zane assembled to exact his own vengeance. And Zane is telling him in his dreams that Obanar knows the location of the totem which might complete the set.

Zane seems to believe that the totem has come to be in the horde of a dragon named Urthix. And Obanar may know where Urthix’s cave is. It seems the adamantine dragon has laired in a location far from the Underdark.

Deciding to approach the village of the Torrians openly, the party selected one of the captured lion-men and untied him. He seemed more reasonable the rest and less susceptible to the “whispers” which the others seemed tormented by. When they got to the village, they were greeted by an older Torrian who seemed willing to speak as a leader: “I am Gruthow. Who are you?”

When the man she knew as Raven approached Magdalene about finding Obanar, Maggie realized now neatly this fit into her own plans. She had been hoping to convince the council in Overlook to send two champions to Argent to help Obanar. She was quite sure that Raven and Drake the Enforcer would wear the Silver Cloaks with honor. Since they are both associated with The Order of the Black Feather and the Raven Queen, their service will reflect well on the goddess of death as some one who had come to the aid of Overlook.

This should promote Maggie’s efforts to raise the profile of the Raven Queen’s Temple in Overlook. So, she pointed Raven and his fellow revenant toward a ritual caster she knew who could send them to Argent. Eventually, she decided to go along herself to help slay the dragon whose horde Zane had convinced Raven contains the grisly totem he seeks.

Elyas declined their invitation to join in the dragon-slaying, when they invited him. So, Maggie stepped through the Argent Portal right behind Raven and Drake. Obanar showed them he had be researching Urthix because adamantine dragons are not usually found far from their kingdoms far below the earth in the Underdark. He was curious because he had just been told by a band of adventurers that the Torrians who had once served Argent were now residing near where Urthix was rumored to be laired: a place called the Sheltered Woods.

He told them he knew of a teleportation circle near the dragon’s lair. In fact, he had just sent Maggie’s friends to that very circle of stones deep in the Wood.

Gruthow and the rest of the Torrians listened to the members of the Golden Scales with great intensity. Grigore was particularly impressive as he introduced the group and Alexander Winterforged followed up with his usual combination of bombast and theatricality. The Torrians seemed more impressed than Alexander’s usual audiences among the dwarves. Garen Bladerun stumbled a bit, but Copper exceeded himself to reassure the Torrians. And Sam ended with a flourish that obviously impressed Gruthow who asked, “Why have you come to this place? Why do you bring back memories of distant times?”

When Raven, Maggie and appeared in the stone circle, they could help but notice the smoke rising from the cooking fires of a small village on the other side of the river. But their destination lay in the opposite direction: Obanar had scried the lair of an adamantine dragon in a cave up in the hills. Raven believed the dragon was none other than Urthix, whose horde contained a totem of great value to any shaman who wielded the other Tools of Zane’s Vengeance.

They made their way into the dragon’s lair, where they found the dragon on his pile of treasure. Raven noticed that the treasure was far smaller than adamantine dragons were rumored to possess, but he attributed that to the fact that this dragon commanded no kingdom in the Underdark, populated by kobolds and troglodytes who could dig up treasures for him.

Raven demanded the totem, but the dragon’s refusal puzzled him. Sure, he had expected the denial, but it carried none of the haughty pride which all dragons were supposed to share. Indeed, Urthix had a curiously submissive air about him: slumped shoulders and down-cast eyes.

Raven noticed that Maggie did not seem to be picking up on the strangeness of the dragon’s demeanor. Drake, of course, seemed utterly unaware of anything un-Drake-like in nature and was blustering his usual bluster about “this” (which, it seemed to Raven, the other revenant seemed to mistake for another word for sword).

Alexander jumped in with another long-winded peroration which seemed to affect the Torrians better than it affected the rest of the Golden Scales. But Samwise was able to follow up with a brilliant effort to put the rune-priest’s abstract notions into perspective. Copper and Garen fumbled their historical references a bit, but Grigore was able to tie it all in to the current situation by referencing what he had learned about the Torrian’s own history. Reading the crowd, Garen got the sense the Torrians were deeply frightened. As a dragonborn, the paladin is used to evoking this kind of emotion in other. But this time he could tell the Torrians were not afraid of him or the other members of the Golden Scales. They were constantly shifting their eyes from side to side as though looking for something or waiting for something to happen. Gruthow suddenly grew tense, as though every muscle in his body turned to steel. An uncharacteristic smile spread across his face and he began talking in a higher, more shrill voice: "Champions, huh? They’ll let anyone wear those dusty old cloaks these days, won’t they? Tell me, is old Obanar, that weakling wizard, still alive?

When Raven called for them to jockey for position, Magdalene was reminded of something Sam once told her, “For Drake, jockeying for position consists of going up and smashing his opponents in the face.”

One thing Drake’s direct tactics did, however, was take up the attention of Urthix. Using this opportunity, Maggie was able to work her way around behind the dragon while Raven concentrated on healing Drake and getting off the occasional shot at the dragon. Raven was also able to manifest his companion spirit on the other side of the dragon, providing even further distraction.

Unfortunatelly, the dragon had distractions of his own: a large number of suicidal demonic manifestations were hanging around the shadows, willing to swoop in at a moment’s notice and attack Raven and Maggie while the dragon concentrated on the revenant before him.

But Maggie’s positional advantage was destroyed when the real demon coalesced out of those same shadow. Apparently this was the source of the manifestations. This demon seemed to be sorely wounded, however, and Maggie seized her opportunity.

“if there’s one thing I hate more than a prideful dragon,” she cried, “it is a prideful demon!”

Then she launched the newest version of an attack the others had seen before: Assassin’s Strike. The demon fell dead at her feet just as the rest of the Golden Scales arrived.

The dragon’s countenance immediately changed. His posture straightened, and he turned to Magdalene, bowing, “Thank you for releasing me from my humiliating bondage. As a reward I leave you all my meager treasure.”

Most of the party raced to the treasure. Raven found his totem, but the eyeballs which hung from it were too dry and dessicated for the shaman’s taste. He immediately began to gouge out the eyes of the demon’s head (which Maggie had forcefully removed from his body as she killed him).

Then they fell to squabbling: First over the treasure (which Maggie thought should go to the Temple of the Raven Queen for distribution to the people of Overlook who had suffered losses in the war) and then over the name of the group (which Maggie felt should be changed to “Band of the Raven”)

With no arcanists among their group, the party was unable to determine the kind of demon Physandros was, but they could tell he was manipulative and obsessive. Sam was even able to tell he is evil and possibly insane, unwilling to give up control easily: “The Torrians are mine!” he shrieked. “I will destroy them before I let you release them from my will! Hear me well and understand, you arrogant gnats. I am Physandros, and I am power beyond your feeble understanding.”

Leaving Raven and Drake to take up the Silver Cloaks of the Champions of Argent on behalf of the city of Overlook, the party asked Obanar to return them to that very city. Once back in the city of the dwarves, the party broke up over insistences:

Alexander Winterforge insisted on repairing his heirloom hammer. But he offended several dwarves by insisting that “any city worthy of the name should contain at least one ritual caster who knows the Make Whole ritual.” The dwarves, of course, could see no value in a ritual whose purpose was something any good dwarven smith could manage in a much more artful manner. Eventually he settled on a smith in The Forgeworks who promised him a quick turnaround on the repair of his broken hammer.

Magdalene insisted on distributing most of the gold from dragon’s horde to the victims of the recent war. She was able to recruit Elyas in this effort as the invoker is eager to raise the standing of the Temple of Erathis in Overlook.

Grigore Goldforge insisted on visiting his family.

“Daddy, daddy, I saw a butterfly!” his daughter screamed as she leaped into his welcoming arms. Then she confessed to him that she had not always believed his stories about butterflies when she was back in Gloomwrought.

She admitted that she liked his stories about thing with fanciful names like “butterflies” and “faeries,” but she thought they were just pretend to make her feel better in the constant gloom of the Shadowfell.

“But Jerath is a faerie!” she exclaimed with glee before growing more serious. “Only he’s the bad kind of faerie.”

“Yes, Jerath is a drow,, sometimes known as a dark elf.” Grigore explained.

“But how can Jerath be the dark kind of faerie?” his daughter asked. “He’s so nice!”

Rather than explain the intricacies of Jerath’s relationship to the rest of the drow, Grigore decided to voice his own concerns about Jerath: “Honey, I want you to be careful around Jerath. Don’t trust him.”

Coppershot was unable to heal the Torrian whose body seemed to be the one that Physandros was currently occupying while Sam and Grigore failed in their diplomatic overtures toward the other Torrians. Alexander was able to pray up a storm, but his success with the gods was not enough to overcome the failings of his fellows. Physandros seemed to grow stronger with each failure: “Your weakness is evident! You are not worthy even to bow in my presence, let alone challenge me. I would not accept you as a blood sacrifice, you pathetic dredges!” Physandros shrieked as he send forth a wave of dark energy, which sapped the staying power of those in the party with less endurance. The tide of battle turned when Copper tried to heal another of the Torrians. While Sam and Grigore still struggled with further with their diplomatic efforts, Garen joined Copper in healing the Torrians while Alexander help up his successful praying. The combination of prayer and healing actually seemed to hurt Physandros: “Why would you want to hurt me like that?” shrieked the shrill voice from yet another Torrian. “I am Physandros!” Once Sam and Grigore switched to healing, Garen decided to try healing the Physandros himself and discovered that healing a demon can actually damage it.

The High Council of Overlook has a insistent message of their own. While Magdalene has not yet successfully installed Amyria in the vacant spot on the council, she is working extensively with them. So, it was not surprising they chose her to contact the most reliable of the adventuring groups they have lately recruited.

She found them at the Temple of Erathis. Strangely enough, there were looking for her as well. She told the Council of Elders was urgently seeking their help. Amyria led the Golden Scales to High Hall and a welcome which was less brusque than some of their previous encounters with the council.

“Greetings, friends,” said Elder Cadrick as they approached the dais. "We have received a desperate message from Megan Swiftblade, leader of the Freeriders. The Freeriders have discovered that General Zitheruun had a powerful ally in his recent attack on the city. Although she does not identify this ally in her massage, Megan has already survived three attempts on her life and fears that more will follow. If we help her, she has promised to tell us who was ultimately behind the war, hopefully in time to prevent another war.

“Again, we find ourselves in need of aid, and again we call upon you. Travel to the village of Talar and find out what Megan knows. Keep her safe, neutralize any immediate threat to her, and then return her to us. Once she again feels safe.”

Further questions by the adventurers revealed the following information:

The village of Talar, where Megan was born, lies outside the city of Brindol.

Though Megan does not know who is behind the attacks against her, she believes it to be the ally she is threatening to name.

Megan’s message to the council makes no mention of where she is staying, saying only that they should leave a message for her at the village’s Green Dragon tavern.

Soon, Physandros was defeated. A dark cloud of malevolence rose out of the collected Torrians and roiled above them. “You hurt me!” cried the voice of Physandros from the dark cloud. “I shall never forget this injury, this insult. I shall find you one day, and I shall make you pay” With that the cloud drifted northward, into the hills, deeper into the forest. The Torrians came out of their trance and warned the party that Physandros had gone to get a pet dragon he kept enslaved in a nearby cave.

Remembering that Belinda had once shown them a portal outside Brindol, Grigore led the heroes to the Temple of Erathis in The Divine Knot. Elyas was able to teleport them to Brindol. They made their way from Brindol to Talar where they found the Green Dragon tavern, hoping to get a good night’s sleep before Megan contacted them.

Their evening revere was shattered, however, when an earthquake struck. Desperately trying to get the terrified villagers out of the building before it collapsed, several party members were unable to leap to safely when the floor collapsed. While Copper joked about staying down in the cellar “where the beer is,” he and other members of the Golden Scales attempted to use acrobatic skills they didn’t have to leap back to the main floor rather than aiding the party members who were trying to pull them up with ropes.

As a result of this miscalculation, the heroes were barely able to get out of the tavern with their lives before it collapsed. After the collapse they lost valuable time digging trapped villagers from the wreckage of the Green Dragon (not to mention their own supplies).

Once they had a chance to look around, Grigore saw that the vibrant village of Talar had been reduced to ruins: Flames leaped high into the air, silhouetting huddled survivors against the heaped mounds of rubble that were once their homes.

Many of the buildings in the area were partially collapsed and fires were spreading through the ruins. Grigore heard a terrified screaming in the distance along the main track. That’s where he led the party as villagers ran past, a dark shape oozing down the street behind them.

When he could finally see where the screaming was coming from, Grigore was overwhelmed by the sight:

A viscous purple-red tide was flowing into Talar, pouring out from a low, craggy hill at the edge of the village. A tower of mottled stone stood atop the hill, the ooze flowing out through a hole blasted out beneath it. Where twin arms of the flow had circled a collapsed house, fire suddenly flared, trapping a terrified and heavily pregnant woman on an adjacent wagon.

Staring at the pregnant woman, Grigore could not help but think of his own daughter’s words, earlier in the day: “Daddy, daddy, I saw a butterfly!”

...of the Gentle Torrian People...

…requires all of the diplomacy…

Raven approached Elyas with his usual directness. “I have another dream of Zane,” he said. “He has told me the last of the tools of his vengeance can be found in the horde of an adamantine dragon.” Elyas was fairly certain from his history that Zane’s vengeance had been accomplished many years before, but he decided not to interrupt the shaman. “He said that you could send me to the place I must go to find it.”

After deciding to postpone another fight with the Wight Champion, the Golden Scales returned to Obanar to report their findings. The old man was greatly relieved to learn they had located the missing Torrians (in the Sheltered Wood far to the west of the Plains of Chaos). He took them to the second floor of the Guardians Tower, where he had a teleportation circle which could take them to that location.

Once he sent them through (with instructions they could return via the Argent Portal ritual), they found themselves in a clearing in a thick and ancient forest, standing in the midst of an inscribed circle that looked to be as old as the tall trees around them. It did not take them long to discover a nearby river which was running fast and deep. But there was a large shape hiding in the shadows behind a boulder.

They could see smoke rising above the thick curtain of trees on the far side of the river. They might have guessed from the sounds of a settlement going about the business of its day that the smoke came from cooking fires. On the near side of the river they found Torrians, simple hunter-gatherers going about the business of gathering food in the forest…

…and watching for intruders.

“I know nothing of any such dragon hordes,” Elyas replied. “But I can send you to Argent if that is where you need to be.” After Raven and Drake told him that Maggie had insisted that was where they needed to go, Elyas asked them if Magdalene was going as well, but they were unsure. The two adventurers offered to bring the ritual components Elyas would need to send them on their way. “Oh, well,” the deva said, “I guess I shall see whether she goes when I send them along. She will either be there or she won’t.”

It did not take a lengthy parlay for Grigore to realize that he was not the only one talking to the Torrian gatherers. The leonid creatures soon began talking to each other about voices in their heads.

“The whispers,” one of the Torrians said.

“I hear them, brother,” another answered.

“Physandros says they must not be allowed to cross the river,” a third said.

Then they all began to chant, “For Physandros, for Physandros, for Physandros,” as they moved in to attack.

The party kept trying to negotiate. When the Torrians were close enough to see their eyes well, it became clear they were in some kind of trance state. Once the members of the Golden Scales became convinced the Torrians were not in control of their own actions, they still tried to stop the Torrians without killing them.

Grigore even went so far as to tie up those who went unconscious.

No lion-like creatures were hurt making this blog post.

Obanar could not quite remember the reason the name — The Sheltered Woods — rang a bell. He was sure he had known something about it, but he could not recall what it was about the place. Perhaps it was some research: He walked down to the library in the Guardians Tower and began to peruse old books about the strange region west of the Plains of Chaos. “Ah,” he said, “That was it. Urthrx.” For he had once read of an adamantine dragon which laired there. “Strange, what would a metallic dragon be doing in such a remote location?” Of course, the Underdark is remote as well.

Some of the party became convinced a Torrian using a sling from across the river might be the one controlling the others. Sam and Copper crossed the river, but a trap on the other side pushed them back into the swift-flowing waters.

Eventually, the adventurers were able to get all the Torrians who remained subdued and tied.

...Magdalene confessed to hijacking the party...

…to serve her interests in the city of Argent…

…the heroes were finally able to get some rest after the giants and the elementals got what they wanted from their assault on Argent.

The restful bedroll never looked so good to Grigore. Everyone was exhausted from the three fights they had endured in the assault on Argent. But his dreams were troubled by visions of a smaller town: Hope’s Hollow. The dream made no sense. He was back in Hope’s Hollow, a town his parents had visited when he was a child. His parents wanted him to be an undertaker there. Or maybe he dreamed that.

After Obanar told the party that he knew how to make special weapons for all of them, they asked him to do so. He explained that the previous Guardian (named Qwor) had taught him how to fashion Sky Metal into the weapons, but he neglected to explain how to acquire the Sky Metal.

So, the heroes decided to search Qwor’s tomb for clues. This required a trip the main cemetary in Argent, where Qwor is buried: The Necropolis.

Unfortunately, their way was barred by a wight, the shade of an ancient champion of Argent. The wight had long since lapsed into evil, but still retained enough of his memories to be influenced by diplomatic entreaties: Sam the Foresworn and Grigore were able to press the urgency of their situation and convinced the wight that the group must talk to Qwor.

The wight grew enraged and summoned a pack of ghost worgs to chase them out of the cemetary.

They had better luck at the library. They found some books which gave them some insight into the Divine Engine (part of which had been stolen by Breven Foss and his elemental thieves). Sam was able to discover a hidden panel which revealed some secret tomes relating directly to Piranoth and the Divine Engine used to imprison him.

Back in Hope’s Hollow: Grigore tries to find an old friend. Searching through his friend’s house, he discovers that it is the house of an alchemist. Which is strange he. Grigore is sure he has no friends who are alchemists. The house is full of alchemical traps, which keep thwarting his search for his friend. He wakes from this nightmare without resolving the frustrations. He tosses and turns for the remainder of the night, getting little rest.

Before they went to the Temple of the Dawn, the party decided to rest. This gave them a chance to use a rune that Alexander likes to use: It gave everyone they ability to understand religion at the same level as the rune-priest. This was a little more unsettling for the rest of the party.

It seems that Alexander’s theology is highly influenced by his unusual affections (unusual for a dwarf, anyway) for the fey. A disturbing influence for most to have residing inside their minds. But they were able to pray up an exarch of Erathis, who told them there are mysterious astral giants who keep track of the whereabouts of divine engines, including the pieces of the divine engine used to imprison Piranoth.

“The giants of the Temple of the Inchoate Mysteries, in the Astral Sea, are known as the foremost experts on Piranoth’s Bane, also known as ’Klar’ekku.’ It is rumored that they, along with select exarchs of Moradin (such as the exarch Torugar), know the ritual necessary to restore Piranoth’s Bane to working order.”

The dream again: Still searching for this alchemist. Still certain he has no friends who are alchemists. But the friend’s house is clearly the house of an alchemist. There is a laboratory here. There are traps obviously set by an alchemist. And there is even evidence that the alchemist was kidnapped. Evidence of a struggle. With blood. The alchemist’s blood. Again: Grigore awakens in a sweat, frustrated and unable to sleep.

The Torrian research forced the heroes into teamwork mode: They had to systematically search the house of the last proctor of Argent. First, Grigore discovered that not all of the house was completely accessible. A space for a room appeared to exist on the map the ardent drew. But the space did not have any obvious means of getting inside. Copper found a hidden, locked door to the room once Grigore pointed this out. When they called Sam over to investigate the hidden door, he found it was trapped as well as locked.

It took Sam almost an hour to open the door without triggering the trap, even with a little help from Grigore. Inside the hidden room, Alexander found ledgers tucked away in a cubbyhole. In the ledgers, Copper discovered the same name appeared over and over: Thror. Thror’s name was always associated with a number and the same word.

Grigore’s long experience with the billion names of gold stood him in good stead. He immediately recognized the word as an obscure shamanistic term for the yellow metal. And he recognized that another name seemed to be associated with the same amounts of gold: Physandros.

Together with Sam and Alexander, Grigore realized that the proctor (whose name was apparently Thror) was planning something in secret, hidden from the champions of Argent, the Guardian, and even the rest of the Torrians. And his secret dealings were making him very wealthy.

Discovering the lingering taint of arcane magic, still evident on the scrolls and ledgers after a decade, the party was able to realize the magic has the taint of dark influence and mind control, as though the proctor was enticed through magic to leave Argent and take the Torrians with him. Taking up service with the mysterious Physandros definitely left a demonic taint on Thror.

8 Minutes of the Past

Next, the heroes went to a field near the Proctor’s house and drank a potion provided by Obanar. A thick mist rose from the ground, and they became a part of the mist, able to look around and see through the haze of yesterdays: Argent as it once was, in all its glory.

Torrians by the dozens had gathered in the grassy field, each looking anxiously at the proctor’s front door. When it opened, out stepped Thror. Somehow the heroes knew this was the proctor of Argent, greeting the crowd. Aided by Grigore, the party was able to notice the discomfort some of the Torrians. Some were heard to whisper questions about why such a gathering was happening without the Guardian.

Enduring the stress of time travel, the party was unable to understand the historical significance of the signet ring Thror was wearing or detect his arcane gestures. Then they found themselves a more demonic form of stress, which prevented them from detecting the spell Thror was casting over the crowd. It became clear that Zumos’s arcane skills were sorely missed as Alexander was unable to carry the arcane burden alone.

“Argent is all but deserted,” the proctor declared. “Its champions are gone. We can remain here and slowly fade away as the city deteriorates, or we can decide our own fate. It is time for the Torrians to become masters of their own destiny, and Physandros has offered us a place where we can prosper.”

They could not miss the effect the spell had on the crowd, however, especially with the help of the the insightful suggestions from Grigore. The Torrians had become glassy-eyed, entering a trance state. They nodded and cheered at every word Thror uttered.

“Let us accept this generous offer from Physandros. Let us take our families and our hopes and our dreams and sttle the Sheltered Woods, far to the west of the Plains of Chaos. Further, let us agree to the few obligations that Physandros has asked of us.”

Again relying on Grigore’s perceptive insights, the party was able to detect a barely perceptible cloud of darkness hovering near the proctor’s head. The cloud had a demonic taint that felt so unclean they noticed the historical significance they missed before: The signet ring belongs to an ancient cult which was tied to Oublivae, the demon queen of ruin and destruction.

Thror finished his speech, the crowd hanging on every word and ready to follow the proctor wherever he leads them. But Thror was not leading anything or anyone.

He was being led.

When they returned to the present, the group decided to make one more attempt at the wight to get a chance to find the Sky Metal. They decided to use one of Alexander Winterforged’s runes to help with the athletics they had failed at before.

But Alexander needed rest before he could use his rune again. And that meant Grigore had to plunge one more time into the world of his dreams.

This time the dream is different. In the dream, Grigore realizes he is not himself. In the dream, he is his uncle. It all makes sense. Maybe his uncle had a friend who was an alchemist. Maybe his uncle’s friend, the alchemist, was kidnapped. Grigore woke from his rest, fully rested and ready to face the Champion Wight one last time.

The rest and the rune, however used up all their strategic thinking: Emboldened by their newfound athletic prowess, some of the more diplomatic members of the party wowed the skeptical wight with feats of strength. By the time others — less inclined to talk — came forward to impress the wight, he was bored by mere feats of strength.

Delis was able to come up with some obscure historical precedents from the time the wight was alive. This demonstrated an understanding of how the past influences the present (a subject near and dear to what remains of the wight’s cold heart).

But Copper failed his diplomacy check and others did as well. No one tried to intimidate him, and an insight roll was used as a stalling tactic to bring Sam’s silver tongue to the fore. Unfortunately, the wight’s imposing presence reduced Sam to a stuttering mass of insincerity and contradictions.

...Grigore Gets Into the Vaults...

…but not in time to stop…

Belinda woke up the day after her escapade in the Shadowfell thinking she should make herself scarce. Her father didn’t need to be reminded that she had spied on his meeting with Roland.

When our heroes discovered someone broken into the Guardians Tower, Obanar asked them to stop the intruders before they penetrated the vaults below. Rrowthar led them down.

Elementals had already broken in, so the party decided to forego surprise and barged right in on some frost elementals and a Battlewall made of living earth. The Frostfell Harriers died quickly, but not before the heroes discovered that missing them carried a price:

Every time a party member attacked a frost elemental and missed, a slick band of ice formed on the floor below them and they slid into range of the Battlewall’s Earthstorm attack. The earth elemental was somehow able to cause the ground around it to churn and explode.

The 15-year-old girl decided a trip to the theater would be in order. She really wanted to take Grigore’s wife to see Roland and Juliette. Belinda had a theory that the love between Grigore and his wife inspired Jerath to write the play.

Once the harriers were down, the Battlewall retreated into the next room, designed to trap intruders. Indeed, several of the elementals had already been caught in the cells on either side of the trap room. More observant adventurers noticed runes on parts of the floor.

Fortunately these runes escaped the gaze of Alexander Winterforged or he might have been more distracted than usual.

With the Battlewall offering them some kind of aura of protection (as long as they kept their feet on the ground near it), the frost elementals were only able to slide one of the party into a trap they had discovered. Fortunately, the trap was too far from the cells to push Zumos in. And the spell that triggered the slide took out most of the harriers. When Copper was slid by the same harrier, he was able to use his surefooted dwarven instincts to stop just short of the cell.

Once they had spotted most of the traps and Sam had experimented with the cells, the heroes were able to push some fire elementals which had joined the fight into the two cells on the south end of the trap room. (A couple of Frostfell Harriers had been trapped in the north cells before the party even got to the trap room.)

Grigore delayed pressing on to the actual vaults long enough for Copper to go around stomping on the traps until he was caught in one of the north cells. While the party delayed to discuss his fate, Rrowthar told them that Obanar was the only one who could free prisoners from the cells.

Strangely, Copper began to heal once inside the cell. Probably due to his elemental nature.

Once she had used the circle at the top of the Tower of the Septarch to travel to the secret rune circle she maintained in the catacombs beneath the safe house that the Order of the Black Feather had in The Boneyard, Belinda found two people who were willing to go to the play with Grigore’s wife: Elyas and Amyria.

Delis Errinthal was the first to slip past the two fire archons guarding the door to the vault. “This doesn’t seem to be so much a vault, as a prison,” she observed, since some of the safe-deposit boxes (glowing spheres of arcane force) actually seemed to contain stone golems and other creatures as well as magickal implements and items of historical interest.

Inside Delis found Breven Foss (a human somehow infused with elemental energy) working to open one of the spheres. Foss seemed intent on stealing a strange lump of silver and gold which was held in one of the smaller safe-deposit boxes.

Fearing that the Archon Flameshields would hold the party up too long, Grigore cast a Wormhole Plunge on one of the fire elementals, teleporting it into the south cell. Soon, the other fire archon was sucked into the same wormhole and joined his mate in the cell.

As Copper tried to blast his way through the wall imprisoning him, he was actually able to interrupt Foss’s efforts to cast a ritual that would open the arcane sphere and allow him to steal the object he sought.

With the archons out of the way the rest of the party ran in an poured on the damage. Foss was bloodied before he got the sphere open. Still, he was finally able to extricate the item and put it in a bag of holding.

“Grab the bag!” shouted Copper from his cell, apparently more interested in the wondrous bag than its contents. But before Sam was able to pilfer the bag, Foss activated his ace in the hole: an Elemental Recall spell triggered by some damage he took.

He disappeared in a blinding flash of elemental energy.

When she first went to invite Elyas to Jerath’s play, Belinda was nonplussed by how seriously he was taking his new job: He seemed to be just as wrapped up in the politics of running the Temple of Erathis as her father got in hob-nobbing with powerful nobles back. home. But Elyas told her he was trying to convince the dwarves of the importance of civilization beyond just building things. And he thought Jerath’s theater was helping. Since he had heard that certain forces — perhaps even including Maggie — were promoting Amyria as a replacement for the dead member of the council, he decided he might even improve his church’s standing being seen with her.

Once Obanar had freed Coppershot and promised them all food and rest, he told them he had secured the magickal defenses around Argent.

They immediately peppered him with questions about the artifact stolen by Breven Foss. The old guardian told them that it must have been the target of the raid all along.

“The intruders knew exactly what they were after,” the old man said. “They stole a piece of the divine engine used by the gods to imprison the primordial called Piranoth.”

“It appears that the giants have teamed up with a group of elementals from the plane of chaos. I may be wrong, but I suspect this alliance was formed with the express purpose of setting Piranoth free.”

After Elyas delivered a powerful sermon which stirred up interest among the dwarves in the civilizing effects of things like plays, he was more than willing to join the ladies at the theater. Still he seemed concerned that something he had found in Gardemore Abbey was somehow tied to the chaotic forces preventing further efforts to promote Erathis. “My father has an ally in Winterhaven.”Belinda told Eylas when the invoker brought up the subject of the playing card he had found in the old abbey. “Lord Padraic has become obsessed with the ruins of Gardemore. Perhaps you should show this card to him.”

Another Gate Gets Closed

This one in Argent.

Following the battle with the bullettes, Alexander Winterforged immediately went over to the circle of runes inscribed in the tiles of the courtyard, trying to figure out the language in which they were written.

As he knelt there, a lion-head man wearing stone gauntlets appeared in the circle. As Alexander tried to determine whether he was friendly or not, Magdalene immediately recognized him as the Torrian seneschal who had sent them to Argent.

And so did the old man, who strode over and embraced the leonid creature:

“Welcome, old friend. You have chosen well.”

Obanar turned to the newest arrivals, explaining that Argent is under attack. He walked back to the reflecting pool and waved his hand over it. The water shimmered to show a top-down view of the city. A red dot pulsed with an angry light over what appeared to be a great tower. Another red dot pulsed over a nearby collection of smaller buildings. “Other invaders have made it into the city,” he said as he studied the view in the water. “I must go to the highest level of the Guardian’s Tower to restore the protective wards. Rrowthar shall lead you to the intruders so that that you can deal with them.” Then he disappeared, teleporting to the highest level of the tower.

After the old man disappeared, Rrowthar led the party to a decrepit section of the city, taking a shortcut through a wooded area. But the amount of surprise achieved by coming at their enemies from an unexpected direction was limited.

“You are not the annoying old one,” a rough voice called out as they passed a huge statue of some long-dead mage-hero of Argent. “I don’t know who you are, but it doesn’t matter. You are too late, for our task here has been completed.”

Some of the heroes spotted that “task” right away: a large hole hung in the air above the street — a rift of some sort, pulsing with elemental energy.

Others noticed something else: heat radiating from buildings on either side of them.

Before they could approach the rift, a hill giant shaman with a scroll tucked into his belt stepped out from one of the crumbled buildings, interposing himself between the party and the rift.

Most of the arcane defenses that protect the city of Argent were controlled from the highest level of the tower. Alarms, magickal barriers, and even a limited ability to launch attacks directly from the city can be controlled from the upper levels of the tower. Viewing chambers just below once provided magickal views of distant places, but many of these no longer operate correctly due to attacks launched from far-away locations by the powerful entities that unleashed the troubles of a century ago. As he listened to the sound of intruders battering at the doors of the tower below, Obanar knew that he still had some ability to see beyond Argent’s walls, but not the near-omniscient viewing he once commanded.

As Zumos readied a fireball spell, Magdalene jumped atop of one of the walls of the nearest building. As it turned out, the building had no roof, and she could see inside to discover what was radiating so much heat. Magma creatures lurked there, as well as several swirling piles of gravel.

When the plucky assassin (with a heart of gold) tossed her throwing stars at the three gravelshards, she discovered the one she hit went down easily. But those she missed seemed invigorated by the attack. They charged out of the buildings to slam into the other party members.

Fighting fire with fire

More magma creatures poured from the buildings, some biting ineffectively at the heroes, others slamming into them. When Zumos unleashed his fireball, he was able to hit all of them. Ordinarily, elementals of fire and earth would have some resistance to fire damage, but Zumos is no ordinary wizard. He is a pyromancer, capable of producing fireballs so intensely hot that they can burn even fire elementals.

He ended up doing more damage in that single blast than any member of this group had ever done in a single turn.

Once the shaman was hit by Zumos, the rest of the party ganged up on him. He fell quickly, but none of the party made any move to take his scroll until only the rift remained.

Sam, not to be outdone, concentrated his damage on the shaman who was already hurt by Zumos’s fireball. The foresworn one backstabbed the shaman for even more damage than the pyromancer had hit it with.

When Sam realized the intense heat of from one of the nearby magma brutes was threatening to burn just from being near it, he activated his demonskin tattoo (by spending an action point and attacking the shaman again), choosing to have the tatoo protect him from fire damage. Many of the allies of Samwise the Foresworn were also able to resist these auras throughout the battle: Coppershot assumed the Form of the Mountain’s Thunder to resist all damage and, of course, the Zumos is a pyromancer who is always able to resist fire damage.

As often as not, the viewing chambers showed Obanar blurred, half-formed images instead of the crisp, clear pictures of old, which has made it extremely difficult for the Last Guardian to learn what has transpired in the greater world, and to track threats the way he once could. But he could hear the threat below as he worked to restore the wards which protected Argent: The intruders were still trying to batter their way into his tower.

Armed with the information Maggie had gleaned from her perch atop the crumbling walls, the heroes made quick work of the gravelshard minions. Nobody created a gravelpocalypse by hitting a large number of them with an area of effect which would have triggered their charge attacks on everyone.

But the elementals were also hindered by the success of their own ambush. They had caught the party on a narrow lane (away from the defensive powers of their rift). The close quarters prevented the best attack of the magma striders from being triggered by their bite attacks.

The striders can burn across the battlefield in a kind of pinball effect if their bite attacks hit. But in crowded quarters, the benefits are limited. As the magma brutes began to thin out, the striders began to come into their own, burning across the battlefield to attack hero after hero. One of them eventually retreated to the area of the rift, but it went down quickly. The rift’s protective attacks never had a chance to do much damage to the heroes.

Before he could perform all the arcane manipulations required to restore the wards around the City of Argent, Obanar heard the doors below crash open. Convinced the intruders were coming upstairs to disrupt his work, the old man headed downstairs to the Portal Level. On this floor of the Guardian’s Tower there were doors that opened to other places. Portals to distant locations, both in the natural world and among the planes were situated there. But the portal he sought was much simpler: It simply took him outside to the plaza where the door had just been burst in. His plan was simple as well: Surprise the intruders by attacking them from behind.

When they finally read it, the scroll turned out to be a ritual which created the rift in the first place. So, arcanist were able to reverse-engineer the ritual to get rid of it. This would have meant a slow process of aiding the best casters in gradually diminishing the rift.

But the new runepriest had a better solution: He demonstrated an amazing rune called the Rune of Shared Lore. Suddenly all the heroes standing close by found they could understand arcane lore as well as the best of them.

Instead of helping the best caster close the rift, the entire party became the best caster.

And the rift was closed in seconds.

Hoping to attack the intruders from behind, Obanar cautiously made his way through the broken door. No, he could tell the intruders had not gone up towards the levels of the tower where he spent most of his time. They had gone down the stairs. Indeed, he could hear them going down into the vaults as he listened at the stairs. The fabled vaults of Argent keep guard over ancient treasures, deadly weapons, and imprisoned creatures. These stasis chambers are sealed behind heavy vault doors and protective magic. It would hold…for a while. He heard Rrowthar and the others approaching the ruined door. So he hobbled outside to greet them.

Searching the body of the shaman, they found a potion of vitality, three valuable gems, a significant sum of gold, and a pair of gauntlets of ogre power, which Copper quickly claimed.

Rrowthar led the heroes to the base of a magnificent edifice. “This is the Guardian’s Tower. I think it is being attacked from the rear.”

Then he led them around the tower and found a door that had already been broken in. Obanar emerged from the wreckage.

Outside the tower, Obanar greeted Rrowthar and the heroes he had brought from Nentir Vale, “I know you must have a multitude of questions to ask me, and I shall give you every opportunity to quench your curiosity, but I must ask you to remain patient a while longer. Know that this is the city of Argent, and I am its last guardian. Right now, the city is under siege by hill giants and elemental creatures. Even as we speak, a force of hostile combatants is making its way to the vaults beneath this tower. I must complete the rituals necessary to restore and re-establish the city’s magickal defenses. So I must ask you to stop the intruders before they can penetrate the vaults. Soon, we shall speak of the mysteries of Argent, the destiny of champions, and the fate of a multitude of worlds. But first, we must keep Argent safe.”

...Hollow.

At least, not if you do not give in…

Grigore was awakened from a disturbing dream with a summons from the Lord Warden.

“I know you probably don’t know the answer to the question I am about to ask you,” Faren Markelhay told him. "But I have to ask you anyway. Do you know where my daughter is?

The 15-year-old girl took out her treasure box. Inside was a crystal ball and a variety of ritual casting materials. She did not seem all that worried about the cost of such materials. Not because she was rich, although her parents — Lady Alyssa and Lord Warden Markelhay — are quite wealthy. Belinda did not worry about the cost because of her income, income which came from her adventures. Belinda’s parents worried so much about the dangers her adventures brought, they didn’t even think about the income such adventures might be bringing in. And that was just fine with Belinda.

It turned out that the Lord Warden had been moved by Grigore request for Belinda to help with his effort to bring his wife and children out of the Shadowfell. They were lodged there with Grigore’s tyrannical mother at the Goldforge family estate in the Dust Quarter of Gloomwrought.

But Lord Markelhay was not about to send his daughter off to another plane just because Grigore needed her there. He had all the assets to extract the family: His wife could provide the transport; his spymaster could perform the extraction; and Roland’s chief aid could convince Grigore’s wife they were acting on Grigore’s instructions.

But Belinda had resources of her own.

Belinda’s parents had shooed her out of the audience hall when Grigore and her other friends had showed up. But that wasn’t why she was getting out her scrying equipment. She was used to being told that she should not be around when grownups were discussing their adventures. Belinda was spying on the audience chamber because she had seen Roland and Madras heading for the chamber. And Belinda was very interested in what Roland was doing there.

Meanwhile, back in Overlook, Elyas and Magdalene were initiating long-term plans to rebuild their respective temples in the dwarven city. Matron Volorvyn, the matriarch of the Raven Queen’s temple in the Boneyard, was killed by Githyanki puppetmasters who needed her authority to start a fifth column in the city during the war just finished. And, while Lavinya was one of the few major religious leaders to avoid this fate, she had sworn to replace Haelyn at a small shrine in Tradetown.

This left a leadership vacuum at both temples. And Elyas and Magdalene were quick to step in. Lavinya appointed Elyas to rebuild the crumbling Temple of Erathis in Nine Bells, while Maggie volunteer herself as a principle advisor to the new, inexperienced Matron in the Boneyard.

Magdalene saw that the war had left many bodies to be buried and many survivors to be comforted. She quickly mobilized the resources of the Temple of the Raven Queen to their traditional tasks: funerals and caring for the widows and orphans. Taking advantage of the fundraising possibilities in the real needs of these people, establishing a reputation for the temple that could be seen throughout the city.

The young assassin also saw that a political vacuum had opened on the High Council when the Order of the Black Feather’s strike team was unable to save Councillor Itrika Mountainhome from her burning mansion. The council is considering who to replace Mountainhome with.

And Maggie discovered that a surprise candidate has arisen. And Amyria the girl from the Platinum Sword is just the kind of blank slate that Magdalene is looking for: someone who is open to the influence of The Order of the Black Feather.

Belinda was puzzled at first as she stared into her crystal ball. Grigore was talking about her. And about his wife. She didn’t understand at first because Grigore was doing something adults seldom did: He was trying to talk her father into taking her with him on an adventure. A mission to bring back his wife and children. Grigore must really love his family. He needed her. Grigore was admitting that he needed Belinda to take him to the Shadowfell, to bring back his wife and children.

Waiting for Roland and Madras — and Belinda! — was hard. And Grigore’s dream were wracked with more scenes of Hope’s Hollow.

He dreamt of lovers abandoning their loves. He dreamt of sons convinced by their girlfriends to demand their fathers give them their inheritance early. Suicide and murder were all around. Despair overwhelmed hope.

A great place to be an undertaker. His family would have loved it if he had the kind of success he found in these dreams of Hope’s Hollow. But he could not enjoy such success, founded as it was on the temptations and failures of others. Not in his dreams.

Not in real life either.

Grigore found his paragon path in those dreams: “Despair has no hold when I am near,” he heard his uncle’s voice say. And he realized that his uncle would have sought out the source of these temptations — an erodaemon, sucking the hope out of Hope’s Hollow by seducing young men into temptation.

Every time he thought about it he knew what his uncle would have done: Seek out the demoness and resist her temptations and destroy her, ending her depredations forever.

Belinda was sure her father would never agree to let her go to the Shadowfell, but she was amazed that Grigore would even ask. He must be really desperate. She knew he really loved his wife, but he must know how unlikely it would be for her father to agree to such an idea. To her surprise, Lord Markelhay dismissed Grigore and told the ardent-healer that he would think about it. Maybe Grigore was using his mental powers on her father.

Zumos had accompanied Grigore to Fallcrest and was trying to convince the Lord Warden that the Tower of the Septarchs represented a threat inside the city walls if it was not manned by skilled portal masters who could seal it should someone attempt to teleport an army inside the city.

Especially now that the city walls of the Lower Fallcrest district were being rebuilt.

But Lady Alyssa was two steps ahead of him. She had already told her husband that the tower was a security risk. And it didn’t take a portal master like Alyssa Markelhay to tell the current Septarch was a doddering old fool.

Zumos began the daunting task of teaching the Septarch’s apprentice the true art of wizardry. He also began sounding out the Lord Warden on the granting of the title back to the true owner: The Order of the Septarchs from the far South.

It turned out the High Warden was amenable to such overtures, especially if they could enhance Fallcrest’s position as a trade center. But the Warden Markelhay was limited in his ability to restore other towers leading all the way to the south by the size of his own power. And he wanted Zumos’s help in increase that.

It seems that the Lord Warden has committed to a long-term project for increasing his prestige by helping the City of Argent restore its former glory. Argent may be able to assist in this project if the Lord Warden can convince his peers to contribute the kind of aid they once provided to Argent.

That project is going well (thanks, in part, to the support The Order of the Black Feather has lent it). But Argent may face a more immediate threat. Obanar, the Last Guardian of Argent has sent a desperate message to Lord Padraig, asking for help. The messenger waits at Winterhaven with a scroll that will take them all back to Argent.

When Grigore was gone, Belinda scryed her father turning to Roland and saying, “I have a mission for you: an extraction mission.” Then he turned to Madras, “Can you fake a letter from Grigore to his wife?” Madras smiled. Of course, he could. He told the Lord Warden that the hobbit Samwise had Grigore’s handwritten will. He was quite sure the lengthy document would have enough handwriting to use to fake the ardent’s hand. “I want you to leave tonight,” the Lord Warden said to Roland. The spymaster and his assistant both nodded. They could leave immediately.

Once Grigore’s family was brought to him (and Belinda safely returned), he took them to Overlook to see the play. And he set Jerath the task of finding a house for Grigore and his family to live. In the meantime, they stayed in Jerath’s suite in a fancy Elftown inn.

But Grigore’s dreams continued to haunt him. Now, Hope’s Hollow was replaced by Overlook and the shadows closing in on the city threatened his family as well.

Magdalene came to understand that promoting the power of the Order in Overlook meant doing things that would promote the power of Overlook. The Council seems to think that helping the Lord Warden’s grand project in Argent will increase their standing in Nentir Vale as well as Elsir Vale. And promoting the power of the Order will help Maggie’s own grand project.

Elyas was recruited to provide the portals which would get them all to Winterhaven, where they got the scroll which took them to Argent. Not long after they arrived in Argent, it became clear the city was under assault.

Belinda gasped. Roland was going into danger to prevent her from risking her life. And she knew what she had to do.

At first, it looked like the defenses of Argent could hold. But they failed somehow and bullettes were able to dig tunnels into the plaza where the heroes had arrived.

Despite Sam’s entreaties, Zumos dumped all his dailies on the bullettes before other attackers swarmed out of the holes. He even hit some of his own party members with his massive attacks.

Eventually Obanar was able to seal the tunnels and drive back the attackers at the gates. And the party was able to finish off those attackers left in the plaza.

...a Bastard...

…kick its backside.

In a dream Grigore finds himself as a successful undertaker in a gloomy town. He vaguely remembers visiting the town as a child on a trip with his family.

Sifting through the ancient texts (one of his favorite actitivities) at the rune-temple where he was educated, Alexander Winterforged found references to another rune-temple of far greater antiquity than his own. Indeed, it is said that the Mountainroot Temple was built in the days after the dwarves cast off the chains that had bound them in slavery to the giants and the primordials.

But the thing which piqued his interest about this “Temple Between” (as it was known) was that it was built in a time of great optimism among the followers of Moradin. Its builders believed that all races who worshiped the god of the forge could come together in one place to worship together.

Alexander found this accorded well with his belief that dwarves and elves could live together in peace and harmony. This belief was not so well received in the temple he was educated in. And they scoffed when he pointed to these words in their own ancient texts.

So Alexander set out find Mountainroot Temple, hoping not only to find accord between elves and dwarves (and other races, as well) but also hoping to find truly ancient texts from the days when the primordials had so recently been defeated.

As an undertaker people in the dream are always coming to Grigore in their times of greatest need. And their times of greatest desperation.

When Grigore awoke from his tortured dreams, his companions invited him to go to the Dungeoneers Survival Emporium. He was able to improve on their attempts to flirt with Myra, the proprietress. And she showed them her rarest treasures.

Once again, Coppershot saved the day after denying he had any ability to help with skill challenges. Almost as if he were playing a different game.

Grigore realizes that his family would have been more happy if he had taken that undertaker’s job back in Hope’s Hollow (a small village near Gloomwrought, where their estate is located).

At Mountainroot Temple, Alexander found about four things:

An ancient text, long stored here, called the Incunabulum Primeval;

The fact that the book has recent been taken to Overlook, a nearby dwarven city;

The fact that Overlook has recently come under siege; and

Storm Johnson is organizing an effort to break the siege at Borodrin’s Watch.

So, he set out to find Storm Johnson at Borodrin’s Watch.

Undertakers in the Shadowfell are usually priests of The Raven Queen. So, Grigore tries to comfort the desperate mourners as they come to him in their hour of greatest need.

Once Grigore had a chance to spend his loot at the emporium, he attempted to sneak off with the rest of the party’s treasure. Sam spotted him and followed him to the stable, where they found Belinda’s new mounts.

After Grigore realized that he could not steal the treasure when Sam was around, he somehow convinced the rest of the party to let him go “use” it to get his wife back.

Unfortunately Grigore’s mount does not have any planar travel abilities, so they had to find a ritual caster who could take them to the Shadowfell. Tracking Belinda, they found she had returned to her home in Fallcrest.

As he comforts the mourners in his dream, Grigore realizes that his success as an undertaker is predicated on one thing: His failure as a priest. The people of Hope’s Hollow are constantly yielding to temptations which seem to come from outside themselves. They all seem to have quiet, happy lives until they yield to some temptation. It is Grigore’s job to teach them to resist those temptations. But, when he fails, their lives are thrown into suicide and murder, more temptation and more despair.

Alexander Winterforged joined up with Storm Johnson (as well as another runepriest named Baern FuryHammer) and helped break the siege of Overlook. The real siege-breaking, however, was done by a group of adventurers who slew the dragon being ridden by the general who was leading the siege.

Eventually, Alexander joined this group of adventurers, who were heading off to Fallcrest.

In Fallcrest Grigore tried to convince the Lord Warden to allow him to take Belinda to the Shadowfell. But the Lord Warden has other resources, which may allow him to rescue Grigore’s wife without risking his daughter’s life.

And Belinda has resources of her own.

Ironically, Grigore’s failures have led to his success. At least in the dream. Sons murdering their fathers. Lovers leaving their mates to suicide and despair. Every funeral seems to be the result of some temptation or treason. It fattens Grigore’s wallet as it sucks the hope out of his heart. He resolves to discover the source of the temptations.

...when a young drow's heart...

…turns to changing…

The purpose of the play is to show how tragic young love can become. He has turned Roland into himself, a young drow. Indeed, he is even playing the Roland character in the play. And he has turned Belinda into an elvish princess, who can never even think about marrying a member of that bedamned race.

The consequences in the play are catastrophic: The lovers marry in secret and each become convinced the other has committed suicide.

And each takes their own life in despair over the loss.

In another horrible dream, Grigore took the long lonely walk to the great household, he paused in the shadow of his childhood home. The once happy memories of days gone by, now irreparably tainted by the death of his father.

Before they attend the play, the heroes decide to finish the shopping trip they planned before they fought General Zithiruun: A trip to The Dungeoneers Survival Emporium in the Blister. They discover a narrow building housing a quite ordinary supply shop featuring camping and adventuring tools.

The flirtatious half-elf who runs the place eventually succumbed to Zumos‘s charms and showed them a pair of secret rooms where all manner of wondrous items could be purchased. It seems Myra Edgerton, the half-elf, is the entrepreneur who picked up the Restful Bedrolls that the party had liberated from one of Sarshan’s warehouses.

Sam picked up an interesting whistle as well as a Hunter’s Flint, both of which might come in handy when camping in dangerous areas. Copper found a flagon much to his liking. The picnic basket they found also had useful magickal properties.

Grigore’s dream is also tainted by his brothers’ horrible mutilation on his birthday, then his mother throwing the ardent out into the cruel world.

Then it was off to the town of Brindol, where Zumos was able to get his staff repaired and Esterhu found someone to repair the handle of his executioner’s axe.

The party managed to get back to Overlook in time to see the opening of Jerath’s new play Roland and Juliette which they attended with Belinda. Zumos made no attempt to answer the young girl’s questions after the play, instead expounding on his own ideas.

Jerath made a big deal about the heroes’ contribution to his magnum opus. And the play seemed well received, even by the dwarves who prefered his previous effort, Titus Androwdicus. So far, it seems the investment Drake and Grigore made in the drow’s business is paying off.

Zumos made an unusual suggestion at the cast party: That a touring company be formed to take the show on the road.

Jerath’s business is centered around the Orb Theatre in Overlook, however, and it did not appear that anyone had ever thought of taking his plays on the road. Such an endeavor would be hampered by the need to find an actor who could play the role of the drow rogue.

The horrible dream drew Grigore back to that black day he left his pregnant wife and child, dragged out the golden gates while his older brothers and sisters looked on, and did nothing. Grigore woke in a sweat.

Elyas has embarked on a quest to help Lavinya rebuild the church of Erathis in Overlook along the lines favored by Haelyn. A new character, Delis Errintial, has been snooping around trying to find out what the party knows about the Githyanki.

Magdalene has backed the new leader of the Raven Queen’s church in The Boneyard. The new matron (who still refers to herself as Sister Onobquin) seems a little unsure of herself and has been pleased so far with all of Magdalene’s suggestions.

...and so does his dragon

When they arrive at…

“I bring word from Councilor Morgoff. Early this morning, a squadron of soldiers was dispatched to investigate reports of enemies in the streets close to Councilor Mountainhome’s residence. None have returned. As soon as you’ve risen and
readied yourself, I’m to show you the way and ask you to investigate.”

They found the bodies of dozens of Overlooks soldiers scattered around the open courtyard in front of the ruins of the councilor’s house and across the stoops of the nearby buildings. Some were badly burned, some slashed to ribbons, and some rotting as though they’d lain dead for weeks on end. Two dragonborn in heavy armor waited across the courtyard as if proud of the devastation; one stood beside a large, red-scaled reptile exhaling large puffs of smoke.

Ignoring the dragonborn gladiators, the party turned straight away to the Redspawn Firebelcher assuming it was the real threat. Soon, however, the real threat appeared: General Zithiruun himself, riding on the back of a dragon named Rathoraiax.

Both the dragon and the general seemed a bit worse for wear: The general seemed to be wearing a strange amalgam of armor and orthotics, while the dragon’s scales were dull and missing in places.

In his dream, Grigore shook off some vague crisis of faith as he stood at the gates of the Goldengrove estate. The guard greeted him as an old friend.

In a display of discipline which is becoming more common with this group of heroes, the party concentrated their fire on the firebelcher until it went down, even as the zombie dragon lumbered forward.

The dragon’s awkward movements seemed to be impeded by the closely spaced stone buildings of Stonehammer and by its own broken wings. But it made its way toward the heroes.

Meanwhile, its rider (the general himself) was delayed as Belinda arrived on her own flying mount: A dragonhawk, given by the Knights Arcane to the city of Argent and gifted to Belinda’s father by Obanar, the last defender of Argent. It seems Obanar sees Belinda’s father (Lord Warden Faren Markelhay) as the spiritual heir to the promise made by the Empire of Nerath to provide heroic soldiers to man the walls of Argent and keep the forces of chaos out of Nentir Vale (and the rest of the material plane).

Belinda’s new mount appears to be a griffin-like creature with some dragonish features. But as soon as the general struck at the dragonhawk, Belinda high-tailed it out of there. She seemed more concerned that the general used his Barrage of Arcane Bonds attack against the mount than that he had also hit Belinda herself.

As soon as she saw the dragonhawk’s damaged feathers, Belinda flew away and began casting a Portal Ritual. She and the mount disappeared with a promise to return with help.

With kind of apprehension which only seems familiar in dreams, Grigore asked of his wife and children. The guard reassured him that his family was well taken care of. Grigore sighed and handed over his comrades’ earnings as well as his own.

Help did not seem all that necessary as the party tore into the dragon as soon as the Redspawn went down. While Rathoraiax was able to use up all their dailies, Belinda slowed down the general long enough that even with his amazing teleporting leaps, Zithiruun was not able to get into the fray in time to save his beloved mount.

Bobbing and weaving repeatedly through the heroes, General Zithiruun seemed to be concentrating his desperate anger on two of the party members who had hampered his plans the most often: Zumos and the ardent.

Suddenly – out of nowhere – a dragonborn who looked much like Heskan showed up and demanded the gladiators join a more honorable cause than the mercenary army which they were serving. Zumos failed to aid in this effort by offering to pay them more than the general was paying.

“More than the spoils of looting one of the most ancient dwarven cities? I don’t think so,” thought the gladiators.

But Elyas came to the aid of the strange apparition. One of the gladiators, who was already bloodied, even switched sides. Another took off, leaving the general to fight on alone.

The general’s frustration with Sam seemed just as tangible as his anger at Zumos and Grigore, but the general was hardly able to lay a glove on the halfling. When he called out the hobbit, however, he seemed to know the Dardano history and was able to invoke it strongly enough to make the halfling recall his life as a wererat.

He also called out Zumos and Grigore by name, invoking not only Grigore’s middle name, but also Zumos’s association with The Order of the Septarchs. Fighting to the death, he never gave up trying to kill the wizard and the ardent.

On his body, they heroes were able to find a Sword of Arcane Bonds which Zumos needed to fill out Marjan’s Dream, a set of magickal items foisted upon a drunken swordmage by Melora, the goddess of the Wilderness.

In the dream, Grigore did not question how he had made the long journey to the Shadowfell where his parents’ estate was located. That is the logic of dreams: What matters, matters; what doesn’t matter, just happens. And the only thing that mattered in this dream: Grigore had just enough gold to start a business.

The Aftermath:

Overlook has weathered the storm, and though damaged, the city stands tall and proud.

The Order of the Black Feather and its most well-known members (mostly notorious through the machinations of Jerath) are hailed as great heroes, and several different establishments offer them free room and board for several months.

Those most closely associated with preventing the fall of Overlook are invited to dine with the Council of Elders several times over the next few weeks.

Lavinya abandons the temple and instead takes over Haelyn’s duties at the shrine. “If this is where the people wish to pray,” she tells Elyas, “then who am I to tell them otherwise? Erathis needs no stone walls, merely the hearts and souls of those who would bring civilization and culture to the world. Haelyn understood this long ago,” she adds with a sad smile. “I wish I’d not taken so long to learn it myself.”

High Ancestor Durkik has experienced a reawakening of faith. His time of confinement and torture, followed by his rescue at the hands of true heroes, has caused him to reevaluate
the previous years. From a beaten-down, tired, and increasingly corrupt politician, he returns to his younger identity as a devout priest of Moradin.

In helping to turn him around, the Order has gained a grateful and powerful ally, and they have done great good to the religious community of Overlook as a whole. This is particularly important, considering that the high priests of other temples were suborned by the githyanki, and their replacements are all younger and inexperienced.

Over the next months, Durkik emerges as a spiritual leader for the entire city.

This time it is Heskan...

,,,a dragonborn warlord…

…who participated in the second session of the campaign, lo, these many years ago.

It seems Heskan has been holed up in Brindol, celebrating the liberation of the hostages from Castle Rivenroar. Then he got involved with Bram Ironfell’s expedition to the Lost Mine, met Storm Johnson, Raven and Magdalene and introduced them to Rrowthar, a Torrian seneschal he had once rescued.

Together, they went to Argent to help the Torrian. But, when they got there, Raven got spooked by some demon who threatened him in his dreams…

Or something.

“You need to go back,” Storm Johnson told Raven. “And face your fears. There are lots of demons in the Elemental Plane, where I must return. Come with me and I will show you how to kill demons.”

The first thing Heskan helped the new heroes with was an attempt to rescue one of the high council members whose house had been hit by a flaming missile. Magdalene leaped to the top of the stair in front of the unnatural conflagration, and Coppershot seemed to be everywhere, using his superior endurance to help the other party members from being overcome by the flame. Grigore was able to spot a way to the second floor, and mighty Rinoa heaved a beam out of the way, clearing a path.

But then Zumos tried to burst through a door and Sam tried to leap up the burning stairs.

By the time the party had to stop to help them, Heskan’s desperate attempt to heal them was not enough to enable the party to get to Councilwoman Itrika Mountainhome before she died.

Nobody thought to use their magic to put out the fire and no one aided another party member. Perhaps this lack of cooperation is what doomed the councilor. While High Ancestor Durkik took her to a nearby temple, he was not able to resurrect her.

A green-cloaked figure stepped out of an alley and confronted Rinoa: “You guys are not the only adventurers who came to Overlook to make a name for themselves, you know. The Freeriders have come up with some clues as to who is behind this General Zithiruun and his attack on this city. I’m not as sure as some of the rest of the ’Riders, but as soon as I nail it down, I will contact you.” With that, Megan Swiftblade slid back into the shadows.

As the party made their way back to Caer Overlook to rest, they were confronted by three trolls and seven gladiators who had hired on with the general’s mercenary forces.

Exhibiting a level of cooperation not seen since the skill challenge to close the portal in the Githzerai Fortress, the party made quick work of this band of marauders, who must have gotten through the hole in the city walls before the heroes closed it (and before the arrival of Storm Johnson, Eldeath Coppershard and the dwarves from Bordrin’s Watch put an end to the initial assault).

Rinoa and Esterhu kept the trolls from regenerating while Sam and Magdalene poured on the damage. Heskan demonstrated that his dragonbreath was more powerful than the dragonbreath of the gladiators (who were also dragonborn).

But no treasure was found on the raiders’ bodies. They must have been looking for loot themselves.

After Overlook's wall was breached...

…the trolls came pouring in.

Following a comfy night in the luxurious beds of Caer Overlook, the rest of the party recruited Sam to help with their plan for traps in the sewers (in case the beseiging forces were able to get past the dwarven countermining efforts and get into the sewers below the Undercity). The doughty hobbit had just as many doubts as the dwarves themselves about flooding the tunnels with good drinking water. It seems Sam thinks water might be a valuable resource if the siege lasts long.

Zumos was quick to bring out maximum firepower. He not only was able to bring the trolls to 50 percent strength (each) in a short period of time, he was able to keep them there. He even engulfed Copper in flames at one point.

The trip to the sewers was interrupted, however, when they got to Nine Bells.

Trolls had taken advantage of some damage done to the walls just south of the main gate. A catapult hit the wall with a large boulder, knocking some stones loose near the base of the wall. Three war trolls rushed forward with a battering ram and opened it further. By the time the party arrived a breach had been establish and trolls were loose inside the city.

While the dwarves held the walls and tried to keep the besiegers back, the heroes confronted those already inside. There was even a rumor that High Ancestor Durkik was in the area, finishing off some others.

Once Sam realized he was needed at the other end of the battlefield, he made maximum use of a tactical trick: Noticing that his allies were spread out amongst the trolls he needed to avoid, he bobbed and weaved past them all. Every time a troll managed to notice him, he would point at an ally is surprise. As soon as the dim-witted trolls turned their gazes toward where he was pointing, he would dart away to seek shelter with another ally.

Zumos decided to help the dwarves on the walls with some icy terrain distributed inside the gap in the walls. This slowed the war trolls, who were already partly through, and was effective in preventing further exploitation of the opening.

The ice had an unintended consequence, however: The war trolls were able to advance on the party much faster than the Spitting Troll.

The heroes decided quickly that the Spitting Troll was acting as a healer (putting out such fires as might have prevented the other troll’s natural healing abilities. Getting to the Spitting Troll turned out to be the most difficult tactical problem, given that Zumos had delayed him so thoroughly.

Grigore concentrated the flimflammery he learned from Jerath on a two-headed troll: Every time one head tried to argue that his superpowered Unhinging Strike should not be allowed to cause one creature to hit itself twice, the other head would disagree and make a claw attack to drive his point home. The result was that as long as Grigore had power points, he could force the two-headed troll to hit itself twice per turn. Since he had placed a Feast of Despair on a regenerating War Troll early in the battle, he had plenty psychic energy he was able to drain from that creature as it flailed against Copper.

Getting to the Spitting Troll was no problem for the newest member of the group (Magdalene) who simply jumped on top of the nearest building and got behind all the trolls (flinging darts of doom at multiple trolls as she did so). Her short sword soon acquired the ability to do the kind of fire damage the Spitting Troll did not want to see.

But it was not until Sam the Foresworn deftly dodged his way past the main body of trolls that the Spitting Troll was able to be brought low. (Magdalene tossed Sam her short sword to make sure the back-stabbing he was doing stayed effective.)

Once the Spitting Troll was down, concentration of fire took the other trolls down pretty quickly (although the two-headed troll was able to bring down Grigore before Sam and Copper finished him off). Copper was able to stabilize Grigore before he bled out (just barely).

Once the last troll was down, a cheer went up from the walls. Sam turned to acknowledge what he thought was his admirers. But the dwarves on the walls were cheering a respite from the assault.

Magdalene was once again able to bound over buildings (to get to the spitting troll in the rear). She and Sam were able to gang up on the spitter and take it down with a flaming short sword.

It seems a company of about 200 dwarves had appeared on the horizon, threatening to attack the besiegers from the rear. As Sam and Copper rushed to the gap in the wall (where Overlook’s teenagers were already beginning the repair work), they were not surprised to recognize the banner of Bordrin’s Watch at the forefront of this company.

Until the heroes arrive, at least

With the Incunabulum Primeval securely in hand…

(the Caretaker agreed to let them take it when they revealed the dwarf who sent them for it was none other than High Ancestor Durkik), the party returned to The Stone Anvil via one of the gates in the Chamber of Doors. Before they left, however, they were able to accomplish two things:

They helped the Caretaker reconsecrate the Temple Between as Mountainroot Temple, enabling him to reseal the gates.

They convinced the old azer to travel to Bordrin’s Watch to recruit the dwarves garrisoned there to come to the aid of the city which will soon come under siege despite the best efforts of the Watch.

In the tavern now known as The Rock and The Hard Place: The strange shaman known as Raven explained to Heskan that he had been seeing visions in his dreams. These visions told him that only Heskan could aid him in his quest — his quest to find a totem.

Back in Overlook, they were immediately whisked to the High Hall in Caer Overlook. Conducted directly to the War Room, they found themselves in the middle of a Council of War. Two of the councilmembers were missing, but the heroes were asked to stand in for them.

When Heskan protested that the revenant-shaman already had a totem, Raven grew serious, “Zane himself has tasked me with finding the last item of his Tools, the Tools of Zane’s Vengeance. It is a totem, yes. But a gruesome totem indeed. From it depend the eyeballs of Zane’s victims.”

Concentrating at first on the difficulties of countermining and protecting the sewers and the undercity, the party convinced the dwarves to use traps and deadfalls to cover the possibility that the forces besieging Overlook might be able to mine tunnels into the vast labyrinths beneath the hilltop fortress-city. It took a little more diplomacy (mostly on Grigore’s part) to convince the dwarves to prepare to flood the lower areas. It seems they think the cisterns will be more valuable as drinking water in the event of a long siege.

“It is said that the totem demands horrific things from its owner.”

When they heard that the rest of Elsir Vale was being rallied to come to the aid of the city, Zumos was able to use his extensive historical knowledge of sieges in the south to convince them these forces would be better employed in harassing the supply lines of General Zitheruun’s forces.

“Whenever the owner of the Totem of the Severed Eye kills someone,” the revenant wheezed, “they must gouge out the eyes of their victim and use them to replace the eyeballs hanging from the totem.”

Referencing the religious significance of the area, Zumos was also able to suggest a number of improvements to the defensive based on the wars of liberation fought against the giants and the primordials.

“Yuck,” said Heskan. But he noticed the courtesan (who had accompanied the Torrian and the revenant) seemed strangely unmoved by the gruesome description. For a girl, anyway.

Recruiting Aiseki at The Order of the Black Feather’s headquarters, our heroes answered the call of an attack from the air. Seems that General Zithiruun has recruited some immortals to soften up the city for the siege.

Convinced that aiding the Torrian is part of his destiny, Heskan accompanied the small party to the city of Argent and met again with Obanar, the Last Guardian of Argent. Obanar told them of the history of the Torrians. And Raven decided they all needed to sleep in the house where the leader of the Torians (known as their “proctor”) lived while they were in Argent.

Berbalangs were discovered peppering Nine Bells with fire bombs and cavorting in the updrafts caused by the flame. Aiseki immediately demonstrated her value by hurling poisoned modestly modified throwing stars at the high-flying foes.

While Heskan and Aiseki slept well, in the morning Raven told them he would have to leave. A powerful demon had warned him away in his sleep, so they all returned to Overlook.

Almost immediately, they learned of the berbalang’s most potent weapon: Self-sacrifice.

It so unhinged Grigore to see an immortal demon blow itself up that he took psychic damage. Esterhu took it more in stride. He has seen too many cows walk contentedly to slaughter to be disturbed by such a display.

Now Heskan broods. If it is his destiny to aid the Torrians, why should a foolish shaman’s superstitious fears of demons prevent that destiny?

With Zumos channeling Drake and saving his dailies for some hypothetical “big battle” later in the siege, the heroes were not really surprised to see their new companion bound to the burning rooftops and fling herself upon the berbalang who was spawning more all the time.

And Aiseki is worried for a different reason: She feels this arrogant demon has thwarted her somehow. And demons represent the ultimate kind of prideful evil which should not be abided. Someone needs to put this demon down a peg.

While the leader of the berbalangs was able to deflect much of the damage aimed at him, he was not able to keep his spawnlings alive long enough to do much healing. (He seemed to be able to reabsorb them after he spawned them to heal himself, even if they were greatly diminished by combat.)

Someone named Aiseki. Or maybe Heskan, who seems to think his destiny is tied up in defeating the demon. He seemed as disappointed as she that they were returning without fighting the demon.

Indeed, when Aiseki executed some kind of finishing move on the main immortal, the last remaining spawnling winked out of existence (on this plane, at least) as well. Winked out leaving behind a suit of leather armor.

Aiseki wishes she had a group less frightened than Raven, a group like the heroes who have made her guild famous. As she stands at the front desk in the Order’s headquarters, the group walks up and invites her to join them. It is almost as if they are destined to help her.

The leather seems to be made from some animal alien to this world, but also appears to be the perfect size for a certain hobbit.

The party returned to Caer Overlook. Esterhu managed to secure a place for Aiseki to stay near the High Hall.

...or that is what is being claimed...

…by two of the participants.

Grigore and Zumos both offered this assessment: The Battle of the Book was the heroes’ finest hour.

“Where is Hethralga? Why has she not returned with the book?” shouted the Stone-Skinned King.

Grigore was, after all, on the horns of a dilemma: Out of healing surges, the next battle could be his last. At the same time, the fae creatures who had stolen the Incunabulum Primeval were known to be scouting the temple. Now that the doors were all open, it was only a matter of time before they escape with the book (and with the 3,600 gold pieces Grigore had been promised for it).

So, he made a fateful decision. The party would press on into the Lesser Sanctum, where the creatures of the feywilde were hiding with the Incunabulum without more than a few moments rest. While most of the party felt invigorated at their success against the forces of General Zithiruun, Grigore himself had to down several potions to remain unbloodied. Beyond that point, the potions seemed worthless, given the ardent’s exhaustion.

“The harpies have returned,” whispered the Seed of Winter. “But they have not come hither.”

Planning was not easy. The earthquake had opened up a giant crevice which extended into the southern end of the Sanctum. The party decided to ignore this entrance, even though it left the fae an escape route if they should decide to make a run for it with the book.

“Why, sire, The Lady of the Deathly Song has the book,” the king’s closest advisor told him. “She has signaled me that she has the Incunabulum Primeval, but the Caretaker has sealed his exits.”

As it turned out, the approach they chose (through the Shattered Barracks) was well guarded. One dwarven soldier was already there and another swiftly moved into position, hoping to flank the party.

This turned out to be a mistake as the heroes quickly regrouped and trapped the flanker in a side room.

The stone armor embedded in King Cachlain’s skin vibrated with what seemed to him to be words: “If the harpies have returned, then surely the hag could return as well. Perhaps she means to use it for herself. Perhaps she has given it to your enemies. Perhaps she has given it to Sangwyr!” Since he had long since absorbed the armor into himself, Cachlain knew the wisdom of these words to be his own.

All of which proved too much of a temptation for Hethralga.

Leaving the book in the hands of a cyclops (who could actually carry it), she teleported into the fray. The party had allowed themselves to be trapped in a narrow corridor which soon resounded with the thunder of her shrieks.

“If the harpies have returned, why cannot your servant, Hethralga?” the Stone-Skinned King demanded, delighting to see the surprise in Sovacles’s face.

Of course, she told the cyclops to make a run for it with the Incunabulum Primeval if things started going badly. She knew all about the crevice. Which might allow him to escape with the one thing she was charged with retrieving.

Taken aback by the king’s knowledge of a piece of information he had just received, Sovacles was momentarily at a loss. “How did you know the harpies have returned? I only just learned myself.”

Meanwhile, a banshrae dartswarmer took up position in the doorway between the sanctum and the barracks.

He immediately began to pepper the party with darts from his blowgun. In addition to the damage these darts did, they often left their targets dazed.

“I have many sources,” Cachlain laughed. “See that you remember that when you try to hide things from me. Just because you helped me imprison the traitor cyclops doesn’t mean that I trust you more.”

When the ceiling of the Lesser Sanctum began to collapse, the cyclops took that to mean things were going badly.

Although the hag had been referring to the possibility of the battle going badly, this misinterpretation suited her needs well enough.

The armor vibrated again: “Your advisor, the one you call ‘Sovacles,’ smiles as if to tell you he is pleased with the decision he has made about you.” The decision to support his king, that must be it.

But one party member had been planning for these risks from the very beginning.

“Why, yes, my king,” the vizier backpedaled. “I have learned the harpies are back. I believe they are trying to contact Talyrin.”

Zumos was using his Circlet of Arcane Extension to provide artillery support while standing back from the fray. The first time he was hit (after the cyclops was seen stumping toward the crevice with the book) Zumos pretended to turn tail and run.

But his actual plan was to stop the cyclopses from making off with the Incunabulum Primeval.

“The cyclops oracle?! How could they find her prison? I keep my friends close and my enemies closer.”

He was almost too late.

By the time he got to the west end of the crevice, the cyclopses had already entered the east end and were rushing towards him. In a desperate gambit, he threw up an illusion of himself near the middle of the fissure and caused the illusion to imitate a defiant stand, shouting, “Thou shall not pass!”

All of which would have been more impressive if the illusion hadn’t disappeared when the first cyclops (with the book) tried to shoulder past it.

“All these betrayals might end,” whispered the seed, “if you but returned me to Inzira. She might even ally with you against your enemies.”

As the rest of the heroes finished off the dwarves and came rushing back to help the wizard, Zumos hit on a more effective strategy. He attacked the lead cyclops directly. The one-eyed giant dropped the book and continued his headlong flight.

Sam was able to get to the book first (or maybe it was Grigore). Barely able to lift the giant tome over his head, the hero ended up doing little more than handing it to the first cyclops to come running past him. (Turns out that one-eyed giants are much stronger than hobbits or ardents.)

The battle quickly devolved into what Grigore described as a giant game of Blood Bowl (which, by coincidence, these very cyclops may have played beneath the crystal floor of the Stone-Skinned King’s throne room). The heroes discovered it was easy to make a cyclops drop the book and flee, but hard to kill them outright.

Finally, a new hero (who looked a lot like Drake the Enforcer but fought without Drake’s customary total lack of regard for his own safety) entered the crevice….

“Stop pestering me about Inzira!” whispered the king. The bald advisor stepped backward as the king seemed to be slipping back into madness, but Cachlain continued whispering, as if to himself. “Many creatures want you as much as the Daughter of the Frost-White Forest does. Be careful or I will send you to Chillreaver.” Sovacles hurried out of the throne room.

…OK, he fell in as he tried to climb down.

But he was, after all, wearing heavy plate armor.

This fall, however, left him in the perfect position to attack a cyclops as he tried to escape with the book. When the cyclops dropped the book and ran off, he was also in the perfect position to pick up the book and get it back to the sanctuary.

...General Zithiruun and Grigore...

…both had their work cut out for them.

Copper Thundershield once again demonstrated his low-level skills could still be useful to the party by aiding Grigori in his efforts to return the Caretaker (who turned out to be an Azer, not a dwarf) to sanity. Coppershot immediately saw the kinship with him as another elemental dwarf.

As soon as General Zithiruun realized the doors had been opened he rushed to the Chamber of Doors. He knew he could not afford to be trapped within Mountainroot Temple again, not with an army waiting in Elsir Vale for him to lead it against Overlook.

Once the party had explained to the Caretaker what had happened, he said: ““I knew that the tall one wanted me to turn over stewardship of the temple to him.”

After apologizing for allowing the general to take control of some of his constructs (and for opening the doors once he was released from his insanity), the Caretaker explains that he needs to reconsecrate the Temple Between to reseal it and prevent Zithiruun from using it to transport his forces from the Astral Sea to Overlook.

The Caretaker suggests that the fae have looted the vault and taken the precious metals which would be required for the reconsecration ritual. The heroes will have to provide 500 gold pieces worth of precious metals for the ritual to succeed (as well as take the time to help cast the ritual). Otherwise he will have to walk several miles to Borodin’s Watch to find help in the reconsecration.

At the same time, the general’s plans depended on the taking of the temple to allow him to slip another force right into the heart of the dwarven city.

Grigore snuck the two harpies out through the statue of Moradin and found the portal to the feywilde located outside the Temple.

Hurrying back to the rest of the heroes in the Reliquary, the Goldforge scion realized that the rest of the fae could escape just as easily…

…with the Incunabulum Primeval…

…and the chance it provides for a 3,600-gold-piece reward.

He knows they can attempt to pin the fae in their lair, but they might have a secret escape route planned among the rooms damaged by the earthquake.

So, he issued an order to his dragonborn lieutenant: “Recapture the Caretaker. At all costs, prevent him from resealing the doors.”

Reunited with Grigori (who had avoided the general’s forces in the Grand Cathedral by sneaking through the vault and the secret passage in the statue of Moradin), the heroes began to plan their assault.

Those plans, however, were interrupted when the general’s forces, led by a dragonborn gladiator, came crashing through the doors they had damaged before the previous battle.

After issuing these orders, the general ran out the door, leaping onto the saddle of his faithful mount, Rathoraiax, who waited near the grove which protected the portal to the land of the fae.

While our heroes had some difficulty dealing with the one remaining Spitting Troll and the Redspawn Firebelcher, their tank was able to pin down the rest of the trolls while Rinoa was able to pour on the fire and acid.

The result: Battered and bruised, the party is in poor shape to take on the rest of the fae (including the “Lady of the Deathly Song,” whoever that is). Indeed, without healing (or healing surges) it looked likely that Grigori would die…

…in the only fight which could possibly prevent the fae from escaping with the book.

It looked like Grigori might be facing the only dilemma for which a Goldforge is never prepared: the choice between gold and his life.

But then someone read the fine print on one of the healing potions. It seems that the potions only exhaust your reserves if you have reserves to exhaust. Drinking more potions is still possible when all other healing will fail.

The potions should provide the party with one last chance against the denizens of the feywilde who have stolen the Incunabulum Primeval, but only if almost all of them are consumed by Grigori.

...Grigori convinced the Harpies..

…to attack at the same time as our heroes.

He also asked them to convince their fae allies in the Grand Cathedral to attack as well. The harpies promised to try, but could give little in the way of assurances that the others would help. Indeed, the other fae agreed to help, all the while planning on betraying the harpies (as well as the party) once General Zithiruun’s forces had been overcome.

In the actual event, by the time the fae arrived the heroes had so decimated the general’s forces that they panicked. They decided to side with the general and eliminate the true threat (the party, which now looked invincible). Then they planned to betray the general once that true threat was taken care of.

Elyas saved the day. The invoker noticed that the general’s most potent weapon was one of the Caretaker’s Eidolon’s which had somehow been suborned to fight on the side of the very forces who had taken the Caretaker prisoner. Praying to the Eidolon’s deity (or at least to the deity it had been programmed for), Elyas was forced to use his diplomacy to convince the powerful construct to fight on the side of good and help free the Caretaker.

As Grigori watched his battle plan fall apart with a betrayal on the part of his feywild allies, his attention turned to the two harpies he had recruited to enlist the other fae.

Another pair of unexpected allies appeared on the other side of the Reliquary: A pair of dwaves, Eldeath Coppershard and Baern FuryHammer had been hiding in the tunnels ever since the Caretaker was taken prisoner. Frustrated by the inability to do anything to stop the torture that was slowly driving the man they were sworn to protect insane, they had formulated a plan to wait until the two groups of invaders attacked one another.

The two harpies were fighting valiantly. Though they still refused to attack their brethren from the realms of the feywild, they were fighting the forces of General Zithiruun. Just as they had promised.

The two groups of invaders they planned to surprise were the fae and the general’s forces.

But they were unaware that a third group had entered the temple: our intrepid heroes. So, when Sam and Grigori unleashed their attack on the general’s forces, they assumed it was the fae, finally making their attack.

“By God!” the ardent thundered, “I swear I’ll get those harpies back to their home. I will make it my personal quest to see that they make it back to the feywild.”

The general, seeing that his forces were under attack from a new direction decided to abandon his failed efforts to torture the Caretaker into letting everyone go. He took his heaviest assets and smashed open the door to the area where the fae had set up their watch.

Not used to fighting in the holiest precincts of a temple of Moradin, Grigori never thought to look to the statues in the corners of the reliquary. Whose eyes began to glow.

The harpies, meanwhile, had not succeeded in convincing the other fae to side with Grigori. But the fae were mustering with a plan: Pretend to help the harpies’ allies, then betray the allies when the general’s forces were defeated.

The planning for this betrayal was interrupted by the general’s forces slamming open the doors to the Grand Cathedral.

For oaths are powerful makings in the eyes of Moradin. The god of the forge knows that the greatest of oaths are the hammers that forge true relations between peoples: relations that can last beyond a lifetime.

General Zithiruun left behind a rear guard and surged past the fae in an effort to find a place he could defend with enemies only attacking from one direction. The fae quickly decided to go ahead with their planned betrayal.

But the general’s rear guard was so beleaguered by the time the harpies led the fae into the Reliquary that the fae had a new worry: It looked to them very much like the heroes could defeat both them AND the general’s forces.

Especially if they helped the heroes destroy the rear guard.

So the fae reversed the order of their betrayals, determined to help the rear guard defeat the party (but planning to betray the general’s forces and capture the Caretaker once the heroes were out of the way).

If the Queen of Betrayals is in any way behind all of this, she was no doubt satisfied with such a turn of events.

There is no question: In the eyes of the harpies, Grigori has a personal quest to return them to their home.

And in the eyes of Moradin, as well.

Protesting mightily at the fates that forced them to fight two enemies at once (for the fae and the rear guard seemed to be cooperating with each other), the heroes were able to hang on (making full use of Baern’s healing skills as well as Grigori’s).

Planning a big attack...

…the party decides…

…to help Sam explore.

First they sent him down a trap door they found in the Vault.

Then they sent him out to scout the entire dungeon (through the door in the dining room. He came running back, gibbering about tentacles of light — a trap which was constitutionally unprepared to discover.

So, the whole party came along, with the Arcanists in the lead to check for these magickal traps Sam was so intent on avoiding. They discovered the traps were tied to some runes etched in the side of a cold dwarven forge. In the process of disabling the traps, which Sam was able to do once the runes had been pointed out to him, the heroes triggered some of the mechanical guardians of Mountainroot Temple.

Thinking quickly, Grigore sent the hobbit on ahead while the guardians concentrated on the rest of the party. It didn’t take long, however, before guardians (which looked kinda like anvilsJ) lost interest in the retreating party members and turned their hammers toward Sam.

Sam eventually discovered some rooms where the walking anvils showed no interest in following him. Unfortunately, they were all dead ends where collapsed tunnels had closed off any exits which might have once existed.

The plucky hobbit stealthed his way back to the area where the anvils had given up the chase because he remembered another exit. Strangely enough, the mechanical marvels did not resume the chase (a fact the resourceful halfling was able to use to his advantage later).

Skulking around the part of the Grand Cathedral which had caved in, Sam made a serious miscalculation of his climbing ability and fell into a crevice. Forced to follow the crevice to its other end, the plucky hobbit found the headquarters of the fae invaders, complete with an old hag and at least one insectoid creature.

Eventually the halfling made his way back to the area where the anvils had broken off their chase. He found another exit from that area which led to a portion of the Grand Cathedral from which he was able to make an escape back to the Vaults, where the rest of the party waited.

At this point, the entire temple had been scouted, and it was time to make some plans. Grigore convinced the harpies to try to convince the other fae to attack General Zithiruun’s forces while the party headed for the secret entrance to the area where the general is torturing the Caretaker. Grigori also implored the heroes to adopt a modicum of military discipline and follow his orders for once.

They agreed, just so long as they like his orders.

The only question: Which will break down first? Military discipline? Or the pincer attack?

Grigore's Dreams fulfilled

With two prisoners — the harpy quite willing to talk — everything seem perfect for the heroes to gain a great deal of important information:

What are fae creatures like the harpies doing in a dwarven temple?

Why do they seem to be allied with a bunch of strange-looking dwarves?

Are the dwarves somehow connected to the Caretaker and the other dwarves who are rumored to be in charge of this temple?

Where is General Zitheruun?

Where is the Inculabum Primordial?

Instead, the party asked the harpy about how to get out of the temple — the one question a harpy trapped in the temple was least likely to know the answer to. She let them know she wanted little more than finding a way out of “this terrible place.” But she seems to think that the only one who can help them escape is being held against his will by another group of invaders, which she identified as The Others.

As Sam explored the leftmost door leading north from the Chamber of Doors, he found a small tearoom. It had a door leading north and a door leading east in addition to the door he had entered from the south. Closer inspection also reveal a secret door to the west.

When she was asked where these Others might be found, the harpy pointed three claws in a generally northward direction:

the leftmost claw (pointing toward the northwest) twitched when she mentioned “epic treasure”;

the rightmost claw (pointing toward the northeast) seemed to evoke fear in the harpy.

She did not promise epic horror in that final direction, but her emotions seemed to indicate something that promised something along those lines.

As Sam listened at the north door in the tearoom, he heard nothing out of the ordinary (although he may have been distracted by the tinkling sound of coins coming from the secret door). He proceeded through that door to find a dining area with a kitchen beyond.

Hearing of epic treasure, Grigore was distracted from all other thoughts (although he did acknowledge epic battle might also involve epic loot as well as the fact that epic treasure might be guarded by epic monsters).

Since the epic treasure was in the direction toward which one harpy escaped, the party decided to have Sam explore that corridor.

Again hampered in his listening efforts at the east door by the sounds coming from the west, Sam heard nothing there either. Inside he found a room which once housed wine bottles and casks of beer. To the hobbit’s great disappointment, none of the racks had any wine or beer on them.

Coming back with a story about a vault filled with treasure, Sam convinced the party to venture down that corridor. It turned out that the treasure in the vault was long gone (having consisted mostly of wine, mead, ail and beer). But fortunately another vault was nearby.

After clearing the vault of quicklings and harpies (one quckling DID get away), the heroes searched the vault, finding all manner of treasure and magic items. The Inculabum Primordial (or any other religious items) did not seem to be found in the three stashes they found.

Listening at the secret door, Sam became more convinced than ever that the sound he heard from within was the the sound of gold coins being sifted by cloying hands. This was confirmed when he opened the door and saw a small gray creature pawing at a small pile of gold. The halfling was able to close the door without arousing the attention of the quickling.

After the battle, the party resolved to rest and recuperate, seemingly unaware of the forces arrayed against any effort to prepare for what was ahead.

What are harpies doing here?

Harpies AND dwarves, actually.

As the harpies screeched their attack sounds, the heroes swung into action. The closest perches (an archway over a door and a statue of Moradin) were denied to them by Rinoa, who attached stalagmites to the perches. These stalagmites brought a killing cold to any harpy who tried to land there, but were high enough that a hero standing on the ground next to them could hardly feel the cold.

While the harpies immediately adapted their tactics to account for the frozen perches, only Elyas took advantage of the refuge provided by that corner of the room.

Copper and Esterhu tanked the dwarves with help from Drake the Enforcer. And the rest of the party concentrated their fire to take down one harpy after another.

At first, Drake ignored his own observation (attributing it to some mythic creatures he referred to as “Greeks”) that the bird the harpies most resembled was a chicken. He ironically warned that this might mean they could attack after death.

Thus, the party was unprepared when the first of the harpies died, in fact, spring back to its feet a moment later as a one-turn undead creature. Several party members were sufficiently prepared, however, to notice the look of dread on the faces of the undead harpies. One of them even noticed that the posture of the harpies in undeath was that of a crone.

When at last they chose to take advantage of the undead harpies fear, they found the second-from-the-last harpy easy to intimidate. It immediately begged them to heal it. And a quick-thinking Goldforge scion was able to save it in time (for later questioning).

The final harpy managed to get away (presumably to screech a warning to others). But the cooperating harpy and the final dwarf (who surrendered as well) are available for questioning. Perhaps they can shed some light on the mystery of what fae creatures are doing in a temple dedicated to Moradin, rumored to be inhabited by only dwarves, and recently invaded by a creature from the Astral Plane.

In the basement...

…of their latest liberated warehouse…

…the heroes found a trapped room where High Ancestor Durkik Forgeheart has imprisoned while a doppelganger took his place. General Zithiruun has been forced hire a doppelganger for Durkik’s replacement because of the limitations of a certain Githzerai ritual. The general used this dark rite to take over the minds of several high-ranking military officers (including Captain Aerun), high priests (including Matron Volorvyn of the Raven Queen’s Temple), and business owners (as well as one of the aides of the Council of Elders).

The aging cleric still looked a bit worse for wear after his ordeal being tortured by the powerful enemies of Overlook, but he told Ancestor Karros he wanted to deliver the sermon himself. As he mounted the dais, he seemed to draw strength from the image of Moradin at his forge, chiseled into the top of the altar. “I have come to you today,” he began in a surprisingly strong voice, “not to ask you to confess your own sins, but to ask you to listen to me confess mine own.”

But it has its drawbacks: The ritual destroys the memories of the mind which is taken over.

And General Zithiruun believed the mind of Durkik harbored important information about Mountainroot Temple. As it turned out, Forgeheart knew little about the Temple Between (as Mountainroot is sometimes known). Thus, the heroes found the real Durkik badly tortured. Zithiruun had gone to the temple without the intelligence he sought from Durkik, because the High Ancestor did not know much about the temple.

“I was recently captured by the enemies of Overlook and tortured. As I lay there, hanging in my chains beneath The Blister, I asked Moradin what I had done to deserve such a fate.” Knowing what was coming next, Ancestor Karros could not help feeling a surge of pride in his master. “And my answer came to me! For I have been prideful, believing that I deserved all that came to me as your High Ancestor. I grew too comfortable in the prerogatives of this office and too heedless of its responsibilities.”

And so it was that the next morning High Ancestor Durkik brought the party to a dusty room. He was able to manipulate some ancient scrolls which caused a secret mechanism to open a way forward.

Finally, a loud click resounded throughout the room, and one of the walls slid open with a deafening rumble and a cascade of powdered stone.

“This is it,” he told them. “The sepulcher. I cannot go any farther.”

“Once I realized that I had become soft in my enjoyment of the luxuries this office affords me, I began to learn humility…something that is hard to learn when everyone treats you as if being a High Ancestor is just what you deserve. And Moradin sent me a rescue in a most unusual form: An undead representative of the Raven Queen, a revenant named Raven.”

The heroes proceeded cautiously into the room. As they passed each set of chandeliers, the magickal devices hanging from the ceiling sprang to light, gradually illuminating the sepulcher.

To the right and left, stairs led down to an open lower level, transforming the floor on which they stood into a central walkway, with two narrower ledges along both sides of the room. At the far end, an elaborate filigree bulged from the wall, almost hiding the stone door behind it.

The filigree depicted Moradin at his forge. Once someone touched the elaborate iron artwork, the god’s part of the filigree bulged still further, looking up from his forge and challenging the party to construct a parable to demonstrate their knowledge of Moradin’s precepts and the principles by which he asks his followers to live their lives.

“Raven left and brought back two more of the heroes who have repeatedly saved our city. I was humbled by the fact that Moradin had sent such great heroes — friends of Storm Johnson, no less — to save one prideful priest from his own folly. First, Coppershot Thundershield, known to some of you as Copper, tried to bend the tubes which were set up to project mighty spears at my heart.”

The party chose Grigore to deliver their story, The Parable of the Miner. They racked their brains for the history of the great heroes who dedicated their lives to Moradin’s service, but ended up relying on Zumos’s knowledge of religion. Drake the Enforcer suggested a story based on building family, but Grigore elected to go with stoicism and perseverance.

“Copper was able to bend one of the three tubes, but another proved too stout for even his dwarven strength, just as the third — located on the ceiling — proved to be out of his reach. It was then that Samwise stepped in.” Karros smiled as the crowd recognized the name of the plucky hobbit. “Yes, even Sam the Foresworn found the time to rescue me. He was able to figure out how the trap on the door was set up to trigger the spears. Any false move might have sent death hurtling toward my breast, but Sam proved up to the task.”

The rest of the party, with varying degrees of success, performed a pantomine while the Goldforge family black sheep gave his performance (perhaps wishing he had some of Jerath’s skills at telling such stories). Once the parable was told — and accepted by Moradin — a gate opened in the filigree and the party was able to pass through without fighting the chain golems which otherwise guarded the entrance to Mountainroot Temple.

“But it was not Coppershot’s strength nor Sam’s dexterity which inspired me to renew my oaths to this city and forge ahead with new resolve. It was the bravery shown by Zumos, a mage from the southlands. Whilst the others worked to stop the spears from killing me, the Wizard of the Septarchs managed to slip past the bars of my prison and interposed his own body between mine and the spears.” As the faithful gasped in amazement, Karros nodded in satisfaction. His master had not lost his ability to draw in his listeners.

Inside the temple itself, the heroes found something totally unexpected: Not only was Mountainroot guarded by dwarves, but also by strange, fae harpies.

The party had no way of knowing what fae creatures were doing in an ancient temple dedicated to Moradin.

The Enforcer's Mental Resolve Saves the Day

With the occupants of the warehouse…

…fully alerted by the Keystone Kops, our heroes threw together a makeshift plan: Sam and Drake the Enforcer (well, mostly Drake) threw open the front door while the rest of the group (temporarily without a healer) infiltrated through a side door on the upper story of the warehouse.

Unbeknownst to the rest of the party, Raven has become convinced that getting to the bottom of the conspiracies undermining Overlook is the best way to get to accomplish his two goals: Acquiring the final tool in his Tools of Zane’s Vengeance set (a gruesome totem) and exacting the vengeance he promised Sarshan….

With their new tank stuck on the catwalks which crisscrossed the upper reaches of the huge warehouse, the party had to rely on Drake’s unique tanking style: Laying about with his broadsword, while shouting obscenities so painfully inappropriate that they actually caused psychic damage to his halfling companion.

…That vengeance (and the disturbing dreams in which Zane urges him to exact it) have convinced him to get to the bottom of the conspiracies swirling around Overlook. He has been convinced by Drake that the leaders of many of the religious orders in Overlook have been replaced by doppelgangers….

The party identified several of their attackers —

A High Priestess

An aide to the council

A Shopkeeper

Capt Aerun

One of Aerun’s lieutenants

Two other dwarves

The surprising thing: These dwarves (all apparently important people in town) did not revert to doppelganger form when they fell unconscious (thus failing Sam’s Patented Doppelganger Test). Instead, they slumped to the ground, not just unconscious, but dead. Grigore’s attempts to heal them did not seem to work. And his heal checks revealed that they may have been braindead for some days (even though the rest of their organs had been function quite normally).

…Since Raven knew High Ancestor Durkik of the Stone Anvil was one of the suspected doppelgangers, he decided to follow Durkik when he noticed the priest leaving the Temple of Moradin in the Divine Knot without his usual complement of assistants and hangers-on. His suspicions increased as the High Ancestor slipped off to The Blister, a less-reputable neighborhood than he would usually be expected to be found….

Before they fell, these sinister forces displayed a number of mental powers, including an ability to leap across spaces without traversing the gap between. Their doppelganger friends repeatedly attempt to use their powers of invisibility to gain combat advantage on The Enforcer, but his mind proved too strong for their machinations. They ended up wasting their efforts, exhausting their powers trying overcome a more stubborn mind.

…The High Ancestor finally led him to a warehouse. Remembering Zumos was convinced that one of the aides of the High Council may have been replaced by a doppelgangers as well, Raven decided to follow one of them. When he discovered that this aide also led him to the same warehouse, the shaman rushed off to find the rest of the party….

Eventually Coppershot was able to work his way down off the catwalks and pull some of the attackers off Drake (who was absorbing a lot of damage. And Elyas and Zumos did their job: Picking off the minions on the catwalks (who appeared to be the last remnants of the Lost Ones).

…The only party member Raven was able to find was Grigore, who had managed to avoid the bad food and drink at the Pig & Bucket. They quickly rushed to the warehouse and infiltrated through a door halfway up the side of the building. This led them to an office and a system of catwalks. Raven found he could make his way around the building unnoticed by climbing under the catwalks and moving about on the ropes and pulleys hanging from the catwalks (which were apparently there to lift and move large boxes stacked below). Once Capt Aerun arrived and sounded an alarm, it became clear the rest of the heroes were on their way. Especially when Drake threw open the door and began issuing challenges….

Searching the bodies, they found a magickal crossbow and some Gauntlets of Arcane Might. The search of the warehouse turned up little in the way of actual loot, but Sam DID find a trap door leading downward.

Once the alarm alerted the full complement of defenders of the warehouse, only Raven was in a position to see that they were coming out of a trap door hidden in the back of the warehouse behind some boxes. Convinced that was where Sarshan was hiding, Raven hid beneath the catwalks and made his way back to the trap door and down into the space below the warehouse.

Since the last of the Possessed Citizens had teleported out of his sight, The Enforcer immediately jumped to the conclusion that he had teleported beneath the warehouse to the space accessible through this trap door. And we all know that Drake’s assumptions are never wrong.

Investigation is a Team Sport

Whose team is the new guy really on?

As they mopped up the remnants of their rooftop mayhem and hustled their prisoners off to holding cells in the basement of The Order of the Black Feather’s headquarters, the heroes noticed some missing bodies: Seems some of the Lost Ones were feigning death and snuck off to lick their wounds.

Or maybe some of them were doppelgangers, too. Pretending to be minions.

As the stealthy hobbit followed the figure up ahead — sure he was following the doppelganger the party suspects has taken Capt Aerun’s place — a signal came from Zumos indicating the rest of the party had found their target on a nearby street….

doesn’t go back toward the headquarters of the city watch at the Ministry of War in High Hall

the Lost Ones have tried to tail him, without success

The Lost One was recruited to work for Roland. And Belinda took the recruit back with her to Fallcrest, but not before Zumos made a date with her to go see Jerath’s new play, Roland and Juliette. He was unable to convince her it was a tragic romance. Maybe Jerath can spice it up with some spider jokes.

…Sam hurried over to the other street, cursing himself for hiding from the wrong dwarf…

Coppershot “Copper” Thundershield decided he was the right dwarf for the job of investigating the construction in the Divine Knot. He thought he could convince the workers there he was just another dwarf with a piece of wood on his shoulder. But he did not reckon with the fame which has been spreading. An old rival of the party’s has been hired to do security at the temple of Moradin which is being refurbished. Nor did he reckon with the fact that the Ironfell clan has been financing the renovations and providing many of the workers. (Most of the construction workers in the city are shoring up the city’s defenses.) Copper is not that popular with the Ironfells, owing to his association with Storm Johnson.

The Ironfell clan blames Storm for corrupting Bram Ironfell, whom they sent to find the Lost Mines of Karak.

Copper tried to tell the Ironfells that he was all in favor of exploiting the mines, but that was a tough sell: Bram had already told them that Copper and Storm had assisted him in destroying the mines.

Just about the time a fight was about the break out, Ancestor Karros (one of the top aides to the high priest) showed up to escort Copper out. This forced Copper to solo a diplomatic skill challenge for which he was totally unprepared — unless a string of lucky die rolls can be called preparation. Copper found three pieces of information:

High Priest Durkik has assigned almost the entire staff of the Stone Anvil to work on this facility in the Divine Knot, siphoning off good workers from the important business of preparing the city for war. This came as little surprise to Copper, as the party has already decided Durkik is a doppelganger.

The Ironfell clan has invested heavily in the renovations. Many of the workers supplied by the Ironfells are speaking poorly of about the party whenever one of the other workers mentions how many times they have saved the city.

Karros is worried about Durkik.

…leaping from building to building only to be told that Zumos was wrong again…

After their investigations pointed them once again to the Pig and Bucket, the party returned to The Blister’s seedy dive. They found Copper there, slightly the worse for wear.

He had been eating the sausage there all afternoon. And even his dwarven constitution was not enough to protect him from the mystery meat found in those links of tied pork intestine. Assuming the intestines did, in fact, come from pigs.

He was washing down the sausage with weak beer when the rest of the party showed up. They did not disguise themselves this time, even though they knew that Aerun had spotted them spying on him the last time they were here. Several party members DID take up positions outside the building. When the undisguised portion of the party realized the captain of the guard might spot them, they hid in a back booth until he left.

…forcing the halfling to exhaust himself racing back to where he had, in fact, been stalking the right Capt Aerun all along.

As Sam bounded acrobatically to the rooftops to follow their target, he noticed the dwarf was headed deeper into The Blister. Not a place where high-born dwarves who work for the city watch are necessarily welcomed.

Rinoa demonstrated the benefits of her athleticism (she is a veteran of the Special Olympics the dwarves run for races who lack a dwarven constitution). She raced ahead to get a good place to spot where Aerun was headed next.

The Keystone Kops scene which unfolded next was not so much a product of bad planning on the part of the party. Most of them concentrated on aiding Zumos, correctly identifying him as the most perceptive of the party for spotting their quarry. In the gathering darkness, however, Zumos could not make a good die roll.

By the time the foresworn rogue spotted Capt Aerun slipping into a large warehouse, it was obvious he had been spooked by the rest of the party. Any chance at surprise was clearly lost and some kind of defense should be expected as the party closes in on the heart of whatever conspiracy is threatening Overlook. The party was exhausted by their race through the streets, chasing shadows spotted by Zumos.

Murder is a Team Sport

Desperately in need of repairs for their broken weapons, the party asked the quartermaster of The Order of the Black Feather if he might direct them to a weaponsmith in Overlook who might fix their ill-used equipment. As Grigore predicted, the quartermaster directed Zumos to a nearby street in The Forgeworks where several swordsmiths were found.

“Nooooooooo!” screamed the tiny hobbit…

After some bickering about the haft of an axe and the shaft of Zumos’s staff, the brave adventurers figured out that their view of their own actions is not nearly as heroic as the view the citizens of Overlook have of those very same actions. While they seem to think of themselves as the hapless pawns of some kind of sociopathic mind-controllers forever propelling them into dangerous situations, the populace believes they are really as brave and selfless as they appear to be.

…as Grigore selflessly teleported himself into the wave of Lost Ones attacking Esterhu…

The swordsmith was willing to offer a substantial discount on the repair of Drake’s broken sword (especially after the negotiators agreed to let him do a tracing of the sword and The Enforcer agreed to sign the tracing).

…But it turned out it was not Grigore’s brave self-sacrifice that concerned Sam…

Leaving the swordsmith’s shop with the intention of going to Tradetown to fix the wooden weapons, the party was ambushed by the Lost Ones. This time the gangster seem to have brought everybody, including the junior auxiliary. Party member spotted Lost Ones as young as 10 in the waves of attackers (as well as more doppelganger).

…as Esterhu (teleported to safety he never sought) unleashed a flurry of fury all around, cutting the empty air…

Our heroes were able to capture a doppelganger and a young Lost One before the rest were chopped up or fled. Much to the disappointment of Zumos, who wanted more to question.

…it became apparent that Sam knew well how easily the Minotaur barbarian could have killed the gangbangers who had surrounded him, while the brave ardent could only handle one or two.

Elyas found a note in the fireplace in the caretaker’s shack where Grovald had taken refuge. It was badly burned but the part which could still be read seemed to match the description of the note which Lavinya had described to Elyas. (The priestess admitted she wasn’t a very good spy when she described the note.) The four intact lines were sequential:

unreachable for a time, as I must

the priests’ orders as you would my own, for he

s always, be certain you destroy this mis

eneral Zi

Elyas performed an hour-long Object Reading ritual to get specific information about the note and came up with five results in the form of images:

the image of a golden-bearded dwarf (the person who gave the note to Grovald) whom Elyas recognized as Capt Aerun;

the image of a stylized bucket (the place where Grovald acquired the note) with suds spilling from its top;

the image of an older dwarven cleric (the priest referenced in the note) whom Elyas recognized as Elder Durkik; and

the image of a stylized pig, dancing (also from the place where Grovald got the note) in the same artistic style as the bucket; and

the image of a githyanki in a strange armor (the creator of the note) riding a dragon with its lower jaw missing.

While the picture below is intended to reproduce this final image, I acknowledge it is inaccurate in small details. For instance, the dragon is missing parts of its body, but not its lower jaw. This inaccuracy should be taken as artistic license on the part of the dwarf artist who produced it (who apparently felt that he could not represent the scariness of the dragon without a full set of teeth). In other details, it is very accurate. For instance, the armor is accurately shown as consisting of pulleys and braces as well as the usual protective gear.

Sam the Foresworn, Elyas and Rinoa then went back to the Divine Knot to seek out Lavinya at the Temple of Erathis. They told the priestess about the death of her friend and asked her about the images of the bucket and the pig. She immediately recognized their description as being the wooden sign in front of an infamous eating establishment in The Blister.

Although Sister Lavinya warned them to stay away from the Pig and Bucket, Sam, Elyas and Rinoa all went over for some sausages and suds. They found Captain Aerun who may have spotted them as well. He spooked, as did another dwarf he appeared to be meeting at the dive.

Sam followed the other dwarf but learned little more than the fact that it is very likely the “dwarf” is yet another doppelganger. Eventually the rest of the group caught up with them and decided to go back to the Order’s HQ for some rest. Knowing secret passages lead from that storefront to the Temple of the Raven Queen in The Boneyard will not make their sleep restful. More so now that they believe Matron Volorvyn replaced by a doppelganger.

...with a vengeance...

…to haunt our heroes.

As the battle at Haelyn’s Shrine ended, The Angel of Death walked over to Drake and asked him for the mask he now wears. She placed it on her own face and was instantly transformed into an old man. At least she seemed old, shrunken and bent over as she now appeared. She was now wearing the clothes of a shaman, covered in primal glyphs. And she was carrying a gruesome totem from which several human-looking eyeballs depended.

She then walked over to Raven’s corpse and took the mask off her head, placing it on Raven’s face. Now Sam and Esterhu could see that she did, in fact, appear to be a aged shaman whose eyes had been gouged out.

Once she placed the mask on Raven’s face, tendrils of mist began to rise out of the eyeholes, coalescing into the shape of a dwarf, a dwarven smith carrying a hammer. On the hammer was a sigil: a stylized M drawn to look like a pair of mountain peaks with a stylized I imprinted over it; each end of the I is drawn to look like the head of a hammer.

As soon as he saw the dwarf, Drake the Enforcer knew where he had heard the voice of Wicked Fang before…

The sigil glowed brighter and brighter until its radiance nearly blinded everyone watching. When the brilliance subsided they saw the dwarven craftsman standing before them, fully corporeal.

…it was a voice he had heard whispering once in a hellish forge…

The shaman/angel reached out her left hand to the dwarf and he took it. She reached out toward Drake with her right hand. With trembling gauntlet, the blackguard took it.